Injectable Smart Hydrogels for the Treatment of Microbial Infections

Abstract

The treatment of microbial infections is hampered by the development of resistance of the microbes to antimicrobial drugs. To overcome drug resistance, drug delivery systems have been widely developed and studied. Injectable gels are drug delivery systems that exhibit a sol–gel transition under mild conditions. They offer several advantages, such as enhanced patient compliance, ease of application, prolonged drug delivery, flexibility, overcoming side effects that are common with systemic drug delivery, promoting localized delivery for a site-specific action, controlled kinetics, prolonged delivery periods, etc. Several research reports have revealed promising results that require further studies. They have also been explored for the treatment of microbial infections, such as osteomyelitis, uveitis, cytomegalovirus retinitis, transplant infections, orthopaedic infections, postoperative infections, HIV, meningitis, HPV, sepsis, dental infections, acute bacterial rhinosinusitis, infected irregular tubular fistula in the anus and muscle, candidiasis, etc. The therapeutic efficacy of the reported injectable gels reveals that there is still a crucial need for them to be further investigated. However, it is important to highlight that there are few reports on their applications for the treatment of fungal infections. This chapter reports comprehensive biomedical applications of injectable gels for the treatment of microbial infections.