Biodegradable Drug Eluting Beads And Temperature-sensitive Hydrogel Used As Chemoembolization Agents

Transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) using temporary embolic agents is reported causing less post-embolization syndromes and facilitate repeated intra-arterial treatment. Here we report a novel temporary embolizing material, that is, Irinotecan-loaded bovine serum albumin (BSA) beads (Ir-BSA Beads), which were prepared by a water-in-oil (w/o) emulsion solvent diffusion method. Bovine serum albumin beads (Ir-BSA Beads) were formed by using 20% w/v BSA, soya oil (1:10 v/v) as continuous phase and 2% span 85 as emulsifier. BSA beads were able to swell 2.37-fold than the original size and Irinotecan was entrapped by equilibrium swelling method with 9.78% total entrapment. In vitro release studies showed that a burst release of 80.6% in 5h was achieved and maintained a steady release with 88.4% for 40h. As it took several weeks for BSA beads fully degradation so the drug release is not controlled by the degradation.The CCK-8 assay demonstrated that Ir-BSA Beads showed no cytotoxicity to cells and the Ir-BSA Beads showed comparable cytotoxicity to the pure drug against a human liver carcinoma cell line Hep G2.In the rabbit studies, we found that Ir-BSA Beads could successfully be transferred to the tumor site and provide occlusion of small arteries. The present investigation suggest that BSA Beads are promising drug carries and potential temporary embolic agents in the field of interventional oncologyAnother novel embolic agents was reported in the thesis-Poloxamer407 (P407)-a kind of temperature-sensitive hydrogel. P407 is soluble in aqueous solutions at low temperature, but will gel at higher temperature. PTX-P407 was prepared by adding 1g P407 into 4mL 1mg/mL PTX solution. In vivo nude mice model showed that the anti-tumor rate of PTX-P407 is higher than pure PTX. However, both groups showed harm to the mice as the weight of them were decreased one week later. It remains a problem to improve the biocompatibility of the hydrogel.