Microspheres for local drug delivery

Around 40.000 people in The Netherlands suffer from kidney disease. When the kidney function stops completely, dialysis and kidney transplant are the only treatment options left. Due to a shortage of donor organs many patients receive dialysis, despite its severe complications. The aim of this project was to study a new, patient friendly, and affordable therapy for the treatment of kidney diseases. The therapy focusses on treating the disease at an early stage, thereby preventing the development of chronic kidney failure.

We developed microspheres of different polymers. With an in vitro cytotoxicity assay we could pre-select candidate microspheres which were not harmful to certain cell types. In this way we were able to reduce the number of experimental animals that is usually required for such studies. Afterwards, we injected microspheres with different chemical and physical characteristics on the back of a rat, and found that the diameter of the microsphere has an influence on the foreign body response. The effectiveness of microspheres with an optimal size of 30 µm was shown in two kidney disease models. We demonstrated that microspheres are a promising tool for local drug delivery, with controllable properties. Such a delivery system may lead to increased therapeutic effects combined with fewer side effects.

Dissertation: http://hdl.handle.net/11370/e894e673-c932-413c-a13f-7e23f422307f