THE‘MAGIC BULLET’ NANOMEDICINE –AS A MOLECULAR DRUG CARRIER FOR TARGETING INFLAMMATION IN RHEUMATOID ARTHRITIS

Farzana Hilal and O. S. Aysha*

ABSTRACT

With an aim of identifying novel medication, nanomedicine is found be instrumental in enabling early detection, prevention and to drastically improve diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of many diseases. Overall, nanomedicine has more than 70 products under clinical trials, covering all major diseases including cardiovascular, neurodegenerative, musculoskeletal and inflammatory diseases. Rheumatoid Arthritis is characterised as a systemic, immune inflammatory disease characterized by joint swelling, synovial inflammation and joint destruction that leads to significant disability. Innovative nanomedicine targets patients on reducing doses of drugs, limiting their side effects on healthy tissues. Currently, there are few nanotechnology-enabled therapeutic agents already approved by the FDA like liposome nanoparticle (NP) with entrapped doxorubicin was reported by researchers to be 300 times more effective because of better pharmacokinetic ability in treatment of Kaposi sarcoma, Abraxane® drug is considered as a major success story of the nanomedicine approach to treat cancer is a natural alkaloid, Curcumin nanoparticles used as innovative antimicrobial and wound healing agents well adorned for their wide availability and medicinal property. Thus, this present review gives a brief discussion on the role of nanomedicine as therapeutic use for treating rheumatoid arthritis.

Keywords: Nanomedicine, Rheumatoid arthritis, Nanotechnology, drug carriers, drug delivery systems.