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How Nanotechnology can help in Targeted Drug Delivery Developments.

There are various studies that are being carried out to determine how nanotechnology can be
used to improve drug delivery especially in cancer treatment. In this technology, the drugs are
only delivered to the cells that are diseased which make direct treatment possible and reduces side
effects. The particles used to deliver the drugs in this technology are designed so that they are
only attracted to the sick cells. This means that the healthy cells in the body will not come in contact with the drugs.

One of the areas where this technology has already been widely tested is cancer treatment. The
treatments that are currently being used for chemotherapy usually cause a lot of side effects
because the drug is absorbed by all the cells and this is where nanotechnology can help. It will
be possible to deliver drugs to the tumors in a patient directly without affecting the healthy parts
of the body. Apart from reducing the side effects, this will also cut down on the amount of time
that cancer patients spend in hospitals.

Research is currently going on to determine how nanoparticles can be used to directly deliver
chemotherapy treatment to cancerous cells. The advances in this nanotechnology will make it
possible for patients to take these drugs orally therefore making it less painful.
Using this technology, nanorod particles are introduced into the blood stream and accumulate in
the cells that are diseased. When the particles accumulate around these cells, infrared lasers
are used to heat them and the drug is injected in the body. The drug will only attach itself to
the diseased cells that are already heated by the infrared laser.

Nanotechnology can turn out to be the most effective way of treating diseases that have intensive
treatments which usually cause adverse side effects to the healthy cells.