Development of Metal-Based Drugs and Application in Clinical Treatment

Metals occur naturally in soil and many kinds of rocks, particularly in minerals and ores, which also play a vital role in living systems such as plants and animals. Over the large time scale, metal evolution from toxins to drugs has achieved a milestone mean in medicine. Currently, a few metal-based drugs (i.e., metallodrugs) have been used in the clinic to treat patients with different medical conditions, making exciting new developments in anticancer therapeutics (e.g., arsenic trioxide and cisplatin) that quickly move into focus. Moreover, a thorough understanding of the properties and effects of metals on the human body could improve the development and innovation of metal-based drugs. In this review, we have comprehensively described the discovery and development of metal-based anticancer drugs, as well as their side effects in clinical treatment. Although metallodrugs have shown promising outcomes in the treatment of cancers, further investigation is needed to optimize their side effect for broader applications.