Nanomedicine and leishmaniasis: Future prospects

Abstract

The increasing incidences of leishmaniasis due to toxicity and resistance of drug as a result of high drug dose and its spreading to newer areas needt to develop newer drugs for its effective control. Major problem in the treatment of leishmaniasis is failure of humoral response. Moreover, immunodepression and particularly HIV-VL co-infection also present a major cause of treatment failure. Chemotherapy using present antileishmanial drugs is difficult due to the location of parasites within lysosomal vacuoles of the macrophages, which restricts the bioavailability of many potential antileishmanial compounds. So the treatment strategies mainly rely on induction of cellular immune response that can be effectively achieved by targeted drug delivery and the vaccine. Lacuna in its treatment regimen provokes scientists to generate a therapy that is cheaper, requires low dose of drugs and specific to its target of action as well. The causative agent of the disease, an intracellular parasite harbors macrophage and specific tissue sites, which can be the target of drug. Thus targeted drug delivery system is the need of the day. Nowadays the advancement in technology rekindles the hope for the treatment of this disease. This new hope is nanotechnology that employs the use of nanoparticles as drug carriers for the targeted drug delivery. Nanoparticles have proved to be highly stable as well as good carrier capacity as well as reduced toxicity. There are several carriers or drug delivery systems available and for leishmaniasis successful therapy with liposomes have shown some good results. For the researchers to develop the nanomedicine (anti leishmanial drugs) for leishmaniasis is on the top priority in order to get the lesser cost and pain of the patients. This article is an attempt to demonstrate the use of nanomedicine for the benefit of patients suffering with deadly disease leishmaniasis all over the world.