Recent advances in thermogels for the management of diabetic ocular complications

Diabetic ocular complications continue to be the leading cause of vision impairment in the world, with a considerable impact to healthcare and the global economy. While there are management strategies currently in place to delay the progression of diabetic ocular disease, risks associated with those strategies still pose a major concern in the clinical field. Management strategies generally involve ocular drug administration and surgical intervention. Some limitations with current ocular drug delivery systems include poor bioavailability of drug formulations and complications arising from drug regimens that require frequent intravitreal injections for drug administration. A vitrectomy is also a common surgical procedure to replace severely damaged vitreous caused by various diabetic ocular complications. However, existing vitreous substitutes used for post-vitrectomy surgery have a certain degree of toxicity to ocular tissues. Thermogels are well-suited materials for the treatment of diabetic ocular diseases as they could mimic the properties of ocular tissues to maintain the viability of therapeutics, serve as drug delivery depots and be tailored to be mechanically robust and non-toxic. Furthermore, the thermoresponsive property of thermogels imparts in situ gelling properties to create injectable mediums for minimally invasive disease management strategies. This review covers some of the latest developments in the field, highlighting the advantages of thermogels as sustained drug delivery systems, biocompatible and non-toxic vitreous substitutes, shape conformable implants and long-acting therapeutics over conventional treatments used for the treatment of diabetic ocular diseases.