Papers of the Week

Pain disorders are the primary cause of disability nowadays. These disorders, such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and osteoarthritis (OA), cause loss of function, joint pain and inflammation and deteriorate the quality of life. The treatment of these inflammatory diseases includes anti-inflammatory drugs administered via intra-articular, topical or oral routes, physical rehabilitation or surgery. Owing to the various side effects these drugs could offer, the novel approaches and nanomaterials have shown potential to manage inflammatory diseases, prolonged half-life of anti-inflammatory drugs, reduced systemic toxicity, provide specific targeting, and refined their bioavailability. This review discusses in brief about the pain pathophysiology and its types. The review summarizes the conventional therapies used to treat pain disorders and the need for novel strategies to overcome the adverse effects of conventional therapies. The review describes the recent advancements in nanotherapeutics for inflammatory diseases using several lipids, polymers and other materials and their excellent efficiency in improving the treatment over conventional therapies. The results of the nanotherapeutic studies inferred that the necessity to use nanocarriers is due to their controlled release, targeting drug delivery to inflamed tissues, low toxicity and biocompatibility. Therefore, it is possible to assert that nanotechnology will emerge as a great tool for advancing the treatment of pain disorders in the near future.