An overview of the characteristics, toxicity, and treatment methods for the degradation of pharmaceutically active compounds: Naproxen as a case study

With the passage of time and the progress of human societies, researchers found that in addition to common pollutants, which are produced and consumed daily, pharmaceutical compounds are also considered one of the most important sources of pollution, especially water pollution. Naproxen (NPX) is widely used in humans as a pain reliever to reduce the mentioned symptoms. Also, naproxen is used in veterinary and aquaculture industries. Therefore, due to the widespread and unsupervised use, large concentrations of this chemical compound enter the environment through various ways such as human and animal excreta, undesirable disposal of expired drugs, and after that cause pollution of water sources. Finally, they lead to toxicity and side effects for humans and/or living organisms. So, it is necessary to remove this type of medicinal chemical composition from water resources and the environment by using environmentally friendly, efficient technology. The results were assessed from the Scopus database from 2004 until 2022, especially the last five years. In this review, to remove NPX from pharmaceutical wastewater and aquatic environments, different methods and processes, including chemical/photochemical processes, as well as the use of physical, biological methods, and the hybrid process have been evaluated in detail for the first time. Besides, the pharmaceutical properties of naproxen, its environmental effects, degradation mechanism, reaction pathways, intermediate products, critical water metrics factors affecting the degradation process, and final products of NPX are also summarized. Thus, this review supplied a tutorial basis for the researchers working in the environmental/pharmaceutical issue area.