Three-dimensional printing technology, also called additive manufacturing technology, is used to prepare personalized 3D-printed drugs through computer-aided model design. In recent years, the use of 3D printing technology in the pharmaceutical field has become increasingly sophisticated. In addition to the successful commercialization of Spritam^® in 2015, there has been a succession of Triastek’s 3D-printed drug applications that have received investigational new drug (IND) approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Compared with traditional drug preparation processes, 3D printing technology has significant advantages in personalized drug manufacturing, allowing easy manufacturing of preparations with complex structures or drug release behaviors and rapid manufacturing of small batches of drugs. This review summaries the mechanisms of the most commonly used 3D printing technologies, describes their characteristics, advantages, disadvantages, and applications in the pharmaceutical industry, analyzes the progress of global commercialization of 3D printed drugs and their problems and challenges, reflects the development trends of the 3D printed drug industry, and guides researchers engaged in 3D printed drugs.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing is an additive manufacturing technique that creates objects under computer control. Owing to the rapid advancement of science and technology, 3D printing technology has been widely utilized in processing and manufacturing but rarely used in the pharmaceutical field. The first commercial form of Spritam^® immediate-release tablet was approved by FDA in 2015, which promoted the advancement of 3D printing technology in pharmaceutical development. Three-dimensional printing technology is able to meet individual treatment demands with customized size, shape, and release rate, which overcomes the difficulties of traditional pharmaceutical technology. This paper intends to discuss the critical process parameters of binder jet 3D printing technology, list its application in pharmaceutical manufacturing in recent years, summarize the still-open questions, and demonstrate its great potential in the pharmaceutical industry.

Meloxicam (MLX) is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis. However, its poor water solubility limits the dissolution process and influences absorption. In order to solve this problem and improve its bioavailability, we prepared it in nanocrystals with three different particle sizes to improve solubility and compare the differences between various particle sizes. The nanocrystal particle sizes were studied through dynamic light scattering (DLS) and laser scattering (LS). Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) was used to characterize the morphology of nanocrystals. The sizes of meloxicam-nanocrystals-A (MLX-NCs-A), meloxicam-nanocrystals-B (MLX-NCs-B), and meloxicam-nanocrystals-C (MLX-NCs-C) were 3.262 ± 0.016 μm, 460.2 ± 9.5 nm, and 204.9 ± 2.8 nm, respectively. Molecular simulation was used to explore the distribution and interaction energy of MLX molecules and stabilizer molecules in water. The results of differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD) proved that the crystalline state did not change in the preparation process. Transport studies of the Caco-2 cell model indicated that the cumulative degree of transport would increase as the particle size decreased. Additionally, plasma concentration–time curves showed that the AUC_0–∞ of MLX-NCs-C were 3.58- and 2.92-fold greater than those of MLX-NCs-A and MLX-NCs-B, respectively. These results indicate that preparing MLX in nanocrystals can effectively improve the bioavailability, and the particle size of nanocrystals is an important factor in transmission and absorption.