Surfactant systems: microemulsions and vesicles as vehicles for drug delivery.

Although surfactants have been widely used as pharmaceutical adjuvants for many years, it is only relatively recently that their phase structures have been seriously considered as drug delivery vehicles per se. This review highlights the work to date investigating the potential of microemulsions as drug carriers and also reports on preliminary studies performed on the use of vesicles formed from nonionic surfactants.