Nanostructured Lipid Carrier as a Strategy for the Treatment of Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is a malignant neoplasm of epithelial cells that affects both sexes and represents a critical public health issue that causes thousands of deaths annually worldwide. Conventional treatment, although clinically effective, is associated with the development of resistance in more advanced stages of the disease and high toxicity in healthy cells, leading to a poor prognosis. Furthermore, the active compounds that represent these therapeutic classes possess inadequate biopharmaceutical classifications, which hinders their solubility in a physiological environment. Aiming to optimize clinical practice, the nanoencapsulation of these active substances in nanostructured lipid carriers is an attractive and viable alternative for the pharmaceutical industry, benefiting patients. Therefore, this chapter will approach an overview regarding breast cancer and the present NLC developed and used in the preclinical studies against the disease in focus, addressing their physicochemical characteristics, advantages, and disadvantages, among other important aspects.