Thesis (Ph.D.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Pharmacy - Department of Pharmaceutics

Fungal infections are one of the most commonly encountered diseases affecting the skin. Treatment approaches include both topical and systemic antifungal agents. Antifungal agents used topically are generally preferred due to drawbacks encountered with the conventional systemic treatment; including specific organic toxicity, interaction with other therapeutic agents and an increase in the cost of treatment. Since the therapeutic efficacy of a locally applied drug depends mainly on its ability to penetrate and permeate the skin, Conventional formulations are slowly becoming outdated and replaced by other novel carriers that are able to overcome the skin barrier. Vesicular systems are among the promising delivery systems to achieve the topical delivery of antifungal agents.Terconazole (TCZ) is a new broad-spectrum topical antifungal agent that belongs to the triazole class of drugs and is used mainly in the treatment of vulvovaginal candidiasis. It shows better mycological and clinical cure rates in comparison with other imidazole antifungal agents in the treatment of fungal infections.TCZ acts by inhibition of the fungal cytochrome P-450 dependent 14a-demethylase.Thereby, the composition of sterol is changed.The clinical use of TCZ is limited because of its poor permeability characters. Based on the aspects of both drug and disease consideration, several nanocarriers (NC) were developed to select the most promising carrier for successful drug delivery. However, the skin is one of the tightest barriers of the human body due to the presence of stratum corneum (SC). SC, the uppermost layer of the skin, is hygroscopic impermeable to water and behaves as the rate-limiting step for drugs' diffusion across the skin

Issued also as CD