Company Says It Has Determined How Carrier Red Blood Cells Can Release Their Payload.

2001 JUL 26 - (NewsRx.com & NewsRx.net) --

Drugs might soon be dispatched with pinpoint accuracy to diseased organs by using a patient's own red blood cells as drug-carrying torpedoes, reported the June 30, 2001, issue of New Scientist.

The drug is released precisely where it is needed by focusing ultrasound on the diseased tissue to make the blood cells burst open. This should allow potent drugs such as anti-cancer agents to be unleashed at tumor sites while sparing healthy cells elsewhere.

"What could be better for delivering drugs than a patient's own cells?" asks Les Russell, who runs Gendel (Coleraine, Northern Ireland), the company behind the …