Biomedical Applications of Nanomedicine in Chronic Kidney Disease

Background: Nanomedicine has expanded biomedical applications in chronic kidney disease (CKD), including diagnostics, monitoring, targeted therapy, and extracorporeal management. However, heterogeneity in materials, experimental models, and translational development complicates assessment of clinical progress. This review characterized major CKD nanomedicine applications and their documented translational stages. Methods: English-language original studies indexed in PubMed/MEDLINE between 1 July 2021 and 1 July 2026 were organized into 11 overlapping thematic categories and classified according to their highest documented translational stage. Results: Of 288 records identified, 160 studies across 91 journals were included. The most frequent categories were nanodiagnostics and biosensors (53 studies), nanotherapy for renal fibrosis (51), kidney-targeted drug delivery (28), and redox nanomedicine, inflammation, and oxidative stress (27). Diagnostic platforms more frequently reached human-sample validation or early clinical evaluation, whereas therapeutic approaches remained predominantly preclinical. Extracorporeal nanotechnologies were largely experimental, with limited human-sample evaluation. Conclusions: CKD nanomedicine exhibits substantial technological diversity but uneven translational development. Progress toward clinical implementation requires standardized physicochemical characterization, reproducibility, independent validation, long-term safety assessment, manufacturing scalability, and rigorous comparisons with established standards of care using clinically meaningful outcomes.