Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is one of the most common
malignancies
in the urinary system and is not sensitive to chemotherapy or radiotherapy
in its advanced stages. Sunitinib is recommended as a first-line target
drug for unresectable and metastatic RCC by targeting tyrosine kinase-related
signaling pathways, but its therapeutic effect is unsatisfactory.
Recently, nanomaterials have shown great prospects in the medical
field because of their unique physicochemical properties. Particularly,
liposomes are considered as ideal drug delivery systems due to their
biodegradability, biocompatibility, and ideal drug-loading efficiency.
Considering that tumor supplying artery injection can directly distribute
drugs into tumor tissues, in this study, liposomes were employed to
encapsulate water-insoluble sunitinib to construct the liposome@sunitinib
(Lipo@Suni) complex, so that the drug could directly target and distribute
into tumor tissue, and effectively trapped in tumor tissues after
tumor supplying artery injection for the advantage of the physicochemical
properties of liposomes, thereby achieving a better therapeutic effect
on advanced RCC. Here, we found that compared with the peripheral
intravenous administration, trans-renal arterial administration increases
the content and prolongs the retention time of liposomes in tumor
tissues; accordingly, more sunitinib is dispersed and retained in
tumor tissues. Ultimately, trans-renal arterial administration of
Lipo@Suni exerts a better suppressive effect on RCC progression than
peripheral intravenous administration, even better than the conventional
oral
administration of sunitinib.