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Meta-Analysis
. 2022 Jun;39(6):1085-1114.
doi: 10.1007/s11095-022-03188-z. Epub 2022 Feb 10.

Meta-Analysis of Drug Delivery Approaches for Treating Intracellular Infections

Sooyoung Shin  1   2 , Soonbum Kwon  3 , Yoon Yeo  4   5
Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

Meta-Analysis of Drug Delivery Approaches for Treating Intracellular Infections

Sooyoung Shin et al. Pharm Res. 2022 Jun.

Abstract

This meta-analysis aims to evaluate the trend, methodological quality and completeness of studies on intracellular delivery of antimicrobial agents. PubMed, Embase, and reference lists of related reviews were searched to identify original articles that evaluated carrier-mediated intracellular delivery and pharmacodynamics (PD) of antimicrobial therapeutics against intracellular pathogens in vitro and/or in vivo. A total of 99 studies were included in the analysis. The most commonly targeted intracellular pathogens were bacteria (62.6%), followed by viruses (16.2%) and parasites (15.2%). Twenty-one out of 99 (21.2%) studies performed neither microscopic imaging nor flow cytometric analysis to verify that the carrier particles are present in the infected cells. Only 31.3% of studies provided comparative inhibitory concentrations against a free drug control. Approximately 8% of studies, albeit claimed for intracellular delivery of antimicrobial therapeutics, did not provide any experimental data such as microscopic imaging, flow cytometry, and in vitro PD. Future research on intracellular delivery of antimicrobial agents needs to improve the methodological quality and completeness of supporting data in order to facilitate clinical translation of intracellular delivery platforms for antimicrobial therapeutics.

Keywords: Antimicrobials; Drug carriers; Intracellular drug delivery; Intracellular pathogens.

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Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Intracellular delivery of antimicrobial-loaded carriers. Created with BioRender.com
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Study selection flow diagram
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Publication trends of the literature focusing on drug delivery systems for the treatment of intracellular infections, subdivided by etiologic organisms
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Drug carriers used for intracellular delivery of antimicrobials by (a) material types, (b) formulation types, and (c) particle sizes
Fig. 5
Fig. 5
Commonly studied intracellular pathogens
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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