Nail drug delivery system a review

The nail is horny structure. Nail plate is responsible for penetration of drug across it. As it is hard enough the penetration becomes difficult, only a fraction of topical drug penetrates across it. Hence the effective therapeutic concentration is not achieved. The nail plate may appear abnormal as a result of decreased glow. It`s involvement of nail bed, reduction of blood supply, physical or chemical features of nail bed. As a result variety of diseases occurs.1 Oral therapies are accompanied by systemic side effects and drug interactions, while topical therapies are limited by the low permeation rate through the nail plate. These diseases can be cured by achieving desired therapeutic concentration of drug by nail drug delivery system. Human nails do not have only protective and decorative role, but can also be considered as an alternative pathway for drug delivery, especially in nail diseases such as onychomycosis or psoriasis. The physical techniques (manual and electrical nail abrasion, acid etching, ablation by lasers, microporation, application of low-frequency ultrasound and electric currents) and chemicals (thiols, sulphites, hydrogen peroxide, urea, water, enzymes) that have shown ungual enhance reactivity. For effective topical therapy, fungal drug permeation must be enhanced.3 This can be achieved by disrupting the nail plate using physical techniques or chemical agents. Alternatively, drug permeation into the intact nail plate may be encouraged, for example, by iontophoresis or by formulating the drug within a vehicle which enables high drug partition out of the vehicle and into the nail plate. Keywords: Nail drug delivery, Onychomycosis, Iontophoresis, Psoriasis.