Nanotheranostics for cancer: Integrating imaging, therapy, and real-time monitoring
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.58445/rars.3555Keywords:
nanomaterials, cancer, Nanotheranostics, theranosticsAbstract
Despite decades of progress, cancer is still often detected late, and treatment remains non‑specific. Nanotheranostic platforms combine imaging and therapy into engineered nanoparticles and could enable earlier detection, precise intervention, and real‑time monitoring of cancer. Nanotheranostic platforms incorporate novel light-activated treatments like phototherapy alongside standard treatments such as chemotherapy. In addition, nanotheranostics enable advanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or fluorescence imaging, which allows real-time monitoring of treatment progress. By uniting diagnostics with therapeutics, these platforms aim to concentrate treatment at tumor sites, reduce systemic toxicity, enable real-time feedback, and ultimately improve treatment efficacy and patient quality of life. This review presents the various treatment, diagnostic, and targeting modalities of nanotheranostics to identify the most promising clinically translatable nanotheranostic strategies. Overall, many reports suggest combined therapeutic approaches integrating multiple therapeutic modalities perform best and are most likely to be clinically relevant.
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