Glycosylated-drug Delivery as Targeted Therapy for Hepatocellular Carcinoma: Are We There Yet?

Abstract

Rapid advances in biotechnologies have opened a new landscape of anticancer therapies, particularly in the development of novel molecular targeted drugs. This works also for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the most common type of liver cancer and the third leading cause of cancer-related death world- wide [1]. The growing knowledge of HCC pathophysiology and its molecular and cellular aspects sub- stantially enhances the progress of new molecular drugs. For instance, sorafenib, the first molecular tar- geted therapy approved for HCC in 2007, remained the only available standard of care for advanced HCC for a decade. However, in the last 5 years, the introduction of new molecular drugs has been evolving rapidly with the approval of additional first- and second-line treatments. In the last 2 years, the emerging potential of immunotherapy, such as immune checkpoint inhibitors, both as single agents and in combination therapies, further increased the success of the HCC treatment regimens [2]. Nevertheless, specific tar- geting of these molecular drugs in HCC is still far from the clinical setting, particularly how to specifically deliver the drug(s) to the cancer cell and how effectively the drugs may inhibit cancer growth with minimal toxicity to normal cells.