Signed, sealed, delivered: The evolution of drug delivery in an increasingly digital world

Drug delivery is evolving to enhance medicine efficacy and patient compliance in our increasingly digital world.

Within the area of pharmaceutical drug breakthroughs, we have witnessed a lot of news, such as big blockbuster drugs hitting (and running away with) the market, controversies over side effects and targeting new diseases, to name but a few. However, more and more, we are seeing a rise in the level of interest and the development of drug delivery techniques. Not only do therapies need to be effective and clinically safe, but now we are also expecting a degree of specificity in how those drugs are delivered.

There has been a wave of recent news items describing delivery methods to transverse the blood–brain barrier. Researchers at Johns Hopkins have unveiled a modification to a drug structure to allow it to cross the protective barrier to the brain and thus target cancers more easily avoiding the usual issues of mass toxicity to healthy cells. Additionally, a Swedish study is underway to examine a drug delivery system that directly accesses the brain for the treatment of Parkinson’s patients.

Then there are the new ways in which drugs are encapsulated to ensure they are released over a longer period of time or are released at a targeted location. Self-administration techniques are also of importance as this frees up patients to be more independent from a clinic or GPs office.

Adding to these considerations, is the complication of modern technological devices and the role they play in patient compliance and monitoring of outcomes. What role can/should these devices play? How can they be incorporated into the developmental procedure?

The long and short of it is, making medicines more effective is of high priority. As drug formulations continue to evolve so must the delivery methods. Ensuring that patient compliance and adherence to their therapeutic schedules are maintained will improve real-world outcomes and with the digital revolution well under way (over half of the world’s population now using smartphones) this seems a logical route to explore.