Periodontitis is an inflammatory disease of gums involving the degeneration of periodontal ligaments, creation of periodontal pocket and resorption of alveolar bone, resulting in the disruption of the support structure of teeth. According to WHO, 10-15% of the global population suffers from severe periodontitis. The disease results from the growth of a diverse microflora (especially anaerobes) in the pockets and release of toxins, enzymes and stimulation of body's immune response. Various local or systemic approaches were used for an effective treatment of periodontitis. Currently, controlled local drug delivery approach is more favorable as compared to systemic approach because it mainly focuses on improving the therapeutic outcomes by achieving factors like site-specific delivery, low dose requirement, bypass of firstpass metabolism, reduction in gastrointestinal side effects and decrease in dosing frequency. Overall it provides a safe and effective mode of treatment, which enhances patient compliance. Complete eradication of the organisms from the sites was not achieved by using various surgical and mechanical treatments. So a number of polymer-based delivery systems like fibers, films, chips, strips, microparticles, nanoparticles and nanofibers made from a variety of natural and synthetic materials have been successfully tested to deliver a variety of drugs. These systems are biocompatible and biodegradable, completely fill the pockets, and have strong retention on the target site due to excellent mucoadhesion properties. The review summarizes various available and recently developing targeted delivery devices for the treatment of periodontitis.

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Periodontitis is an inflammatory disease of gums involving degeneration of periodontal ligaments, creation of periodontal pocket and resorption of alveolar bone, thus disrupting the support structure of teeth causing their loosening and finally removal. Since this disease is mainly confined to the periodontal pocket, so site specific drug delivery of an antibiotic is the best suitable option. This also eradicates the demerits of oral dosing like low drug concentration reaching the target site and the various systemic side effects. In the present work, an efficient and easy technique of electrospinning has been used to develop non-woven drug loaded and biodegradable nanofiber patch with inbuilt property of high surface area to volume ratio. Hyaluronic acid (HA) has been used specifically as the polymer since it possesses remarkable properties like providing an extracellular matrix supporting tissue regeneration, anti-inflammation and mucoadhesion. A blend of this natural polymer with another polymer (Polyvinyl alcohol) has been tried since HA alone cannot be electrospun efficiently as it shows very high viscosity at very low polymer concentration. The developed formulation presented controlled release behavior with good mucoadhesive strength. The in vivo studies confirmed the maintenance of minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) over an extended period of time in addition to a significant antiinflammatory effect. All these observations suggested that the above formulation forms a stable intra periodontal pocket drug delivery system.