title: Contact lenses as drug reservoirs & delivery systems: the successes & challenges.
abstract: Although conventional eye drops comprise over 90% of the marketed ocular dosage forms, they do have limitations, such as poor ocular drug bioavailability and systemic side effects; contact lenses are amongst the new delivery systems and devices that could overcome some of these problems. The most common approach to load drug molecules into contact lenses includes soaking in a drug solution. This approach had some success, but failed to achieve controlled/sustained drug release to the eye. On [corrected] the other hand, nanoreservoir systems comprising nanoparticles, cyclodextrins, liposomes or surfactant aggregates being incorporated into the contact lenses could offer a plausible solution. This review highlights the status quo with contact lenses as ocular drug-delivery carriers and identifies possible future directions.
authors.affiliation: Drug Discovery, Delivery & Patient Care (DDDPC), Kingston University London, Kingston upon Thames, KT1 2EE, UK.
authors.forename: Amr
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: ElShaer
authors.forename: Baljit
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Ghatora
authors.forename: Shelan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mustafa
authors.forename: Raid G
authors.initials: RG
authors.lastname: Alany
mesh_terms: D060433:Administration, Ophthalmic; D000818:Animals; D002626:Chemistry, Pharmaceutical; D003261:Contact Lenses; D003692:Delayed-Action Preparations; D004337:Drug Carriers; D006801:Humans; D050997:Nanomedicine; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations / Q000008:administration & dosage*; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry*; D013678:Technology, Pharmaceutical / Q000379:methods
chemical_list: D003692:Delayed-Action Preparations; D004337:Drug Carriers; D004364:Pharmaceutical Preparations; D011108:Polymers