Application of Nanohydrogels in Drug Delivery Systems: Recent Patents Review

Nanohydrogel combines the advantages of hydrogel and nano particulate systems. Similar to the hydrogel and macrogel, nanohydrogel can protect the drug and control drug release by stimuli responsive conformation or biodegradable bond into the polymer networks. Nanohydrogel has drawn huge interest due to their potential applications, such as carrier in target-specific controlled drug delivery, absorbents, chemical/biological sensors, and bio-mimetic materials. Similar to the nanoparticles, stimuli responsive nanohydrogel can easily be delivered in the liquid form for parenteral drug delivery application. This review highlights the methods to prepare nanohydrogel based on natural and synthetic polymers for diverse applications in drug delivery. It also encompasses the drug loading and drug release mechanism of the nanohydrogel formulation and patents related to the composition and chemical methods for preparation of nanohydrogel formulation with current status in clinical trials.