Useful resources

Regulatory guidelines

  • Not an expert? Here's a summary for you: "Regulatory Pathways in Nanomedicine"
Regulatory requirements in clinical development are crucial, as they ensure that innovative therapies are evaluated thoroughly for safety and effectiveness before they are authorized by Regulatory agencies to reach patients. Nanomedicines, like all medical products, must adhere to strict standards for safety, efficacy, and pharmaceutical quality. Their complex nature featuring unique combinations of nano-scale engineering and medical application, is distinctly more elaborate than the ones for traditional small molecule drugs, which poses significant analytical challenges. METRINO will help by providing specific measurement methods in line with regulatory guidelines and reflection papers to aid in the quality assessment of these innovative nanomedicine treatments, ensuring they meet the high standards required for clinical application and patient care.
Nanotherapeutics are subject to rigorous legislative and regulatory standards, similar to other classes of healthcare products, which are medicinal products and medical devices. When applying for clinical application, these innovative therapies must demonstrate comprehensive data proving their quality, safety, and efficacy. Nanomedicines are held to the same stringent criteria as all drug products. Yet, their hybrid nature, combining nano-scale engineering with biomedical science, presents unique challenges in quality assessment. This complexity is heightened when compared to the relatively simpler structure of small molecular drugs or biologicals like antibodies. To assist the community in navigating these intricacies, regulatory agencies offer specialized guidelines and reflection papers, ensuring a thorough evaluation of nanomedicine formulations for both quality and safety.

Where to access regulatory guidance and reflection papers?

Regulatory documents specifically addressing nanotechnology-enabled health products that may help you are:

All products including health care products

Consumer products including medical products
Electronics, cosmetics, textiles, health products
Products containing nano-silver
Wound dressing with silver nanoparticles

Medicinal products

Nanotechnology-based medicinal products
Albumin-bound paclitaxel NP, Glatiramer acetate
Liposomal products
Liposomal doxorubicin, Liposomal daunorubicin, Pegylated liposomal irinotecan, Liposomal Amphotericin B, Liposomal Hepatitis A vaccine
Block copolymer micelle products
Peginterferon alpha-2a, Pegaspargase Sevelamer
Iron based nano-colloidal products
Ferumoxytol, Ferric carboxymaltose
Nucleic acid-loaded nanotechnology-based drug products
siRNA-loaded and mRNA-loaded lipid and polymeric NPs, ONPATTRO (patisiran),
COVID-19 vaccine - Spikevax, COVID-19 vaccine Comirnaty
Coated nanomedicine products
PEGylated liposomes, products with targeting ligand on the surface

Medical devices

Medical devices containing nanomaterial
Nanostructured hydroxyapatite, Nano-ceramic dental composite, tumour tracers

For Medical devices you may also look at those documents:

REACH information requirements are nicely summarised here:

Metrology for Innovative Nanotherapeutics
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The METRINO project has received funding from the European Partnership on Metrology (Grant #22HLT04), co-financed from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme and by the Participating States. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union or EURAMET. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.

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