Dissolving microneedles based on polysaccharide for dermatological diseases therapy

Dissolving microneedles (DMNs), a kind of drug delivery platform with numerous advantages are proposed to treat skin diseases with high efficiency. It can not only avoid the inhibition of the stratum corneum but also improve the therapeutical effect, being a new choice for dermatological disease therapy. Compared with synthetic polymers, polysaccharide polymers (PS) have characteristics of wide sources, no additives, and are easy to obtain and utilize, etc. attracting the attention of many researchers and are often used as matrix materials to fabricate DMNs. In this manuscript, the brief introduction of skin diseases and PS-DMNs, the roles played by PS-DMNs in the treatment of dermatological diseases, and the widespread applications of PS-DMNs-mediated drug delivery in the dermatology field are reviewed in detail. DMNs made by PS can not only exert treatment effects with the advantages of DMNs, but also exert synergy effect with drugs using their own medicinal effect. Although there are many advantages on DMNs made by PS, some challenges have existed, that need to be addressed including the large-scale production of DMNs and the maintenance of the activity of temperature-sensitive or light-sensitive drugs encapsulated in the DMNs during the process of fabricating DMNs.