Nanomedicines for oral administration based on diverse nanoplatform

Nanotechnology has been applied to the oral drug delivery for enhancing bioavailability after oral administration. Numerous forms of reported nanomedicines are classified as lipid based nanomedicine (LBNM), polymer based nanomedicine (PBNM), and nanosuspension. LBNM includes self nano-emulsifying drug delivery systems, liposomes and solid lipid nanoparticle (SLN). PBNM includes polymeric nanoparticles and polymeric micelles. Unlike intravenous administration, oral administration has more complicated barriers that are hard to overcome. The various nanoplatforms described above are used to surmount physical and bio-chemical barriers due to advantageous characteristics of nanoplatforms. The characteristics of nanoplatforms including particle size, stimuli-sensitivity, preventing drug efflux, solubility and permeation of the drug induce the enhanced absorption and high bioavailability. Regardless of passionate researches, some limitations still exist, for instance economic problems, toxicity issue, and development of biopharmaceutic oral nanomedicine. In this review, physiological barriers in oral administration, advantages of nanomedicines, classification of oral nanomedicines, and their challenges are described concisely.