Insight into Prodrugs of Quinolones and Fluoroquinolones

Quinolones and fluoroquinolones are principal weapons against variety of bacterial infections and exert their antibacterial potential by interfering the activities of bacterial enzymes. As these agents are associated with some limitations, an important approach to overcome these major constraints is to prepare covalent derivatives, i.e. prodrugs. Prodrug design has been employed to improve the limitations of these drugs such as less aqueous solubility, poor absorption and distribution, toxicity, disagreeable taste, poor lipophilicity etc and for improving their pharmacological profile. This paper highlights the utility of various prodrug strategies in optimizing the therapeutic index of these antibacterial agents and their recent patents. Some of their prodrugs being utilized at preclinical and clinical levels have also been discussed. Hence, this paper has been prepared to present the significant findings of various research papers that would be helpful in motivating scientific researchers to forward the research in direction of utilization of prodrugs in clinical therapy.