Disorders of the Nervous System
Author: Aída Marcotti | Email: aida.marcotti@unc.edu.ar
Aída Marcotti1°, María Sol Martínez2°, Rubén D. Motrich2°, Mariela F. Pérez1°
1° Departamento de Farmacología Otto Orsingher-Instituto Farmacología Experimental de Córdoba (IFEC)-CONICET, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba
2° Departamento de Bioquímica Clínica-Centro de Investigaciones en Bioquímica Clínica e Inmunología (CIBICI)-CONICET, Facultad de Ciencias Químicas, Universidad Nacional de Córdoba
Chronic pain is a debilitating condition that frequently leads to mood disorders like depression and anxiety. These disorders are refractory to commonly used antidepressants, likely due to neuroinflammatory and oxidative stress processes, with no available pharmacological therapies. This study aims to assess depression and anxiety-related behaviors, and oxidative stress indicators (OSi) and antioxidant enzymes (AOe) activity in brain areas linked to nociceptive and emotional processes, in an animal model of chronic pelvic pain consequence of autoimmune prostatitis induction. Finally, it proposes repositioning triamcinolone, an anti-inflammatory drug, loaded in nanocarriers (NT) to target brain tissue as a potential therapy. Preliminary behavioral data showed that, 35 days post-disease induction, mice subjected to open field test preferred the peripheral area, suggesting an anxious phenotype in contrast to control animals. In sucrose preference test, diseased mice lacked the control group’s marked preference, with reduced performance in the suspension tail test suggesting anhedonia and depressive-like behavior. Increased levels of malondialdehyde (an OSi) and catalase activity (an AOe) were detected in brains from diseased mice with respect to controls. These outcomes offer encouraging insights for further characterization of neuroinflammation and related behaviors in our model, and for evaluating the proposed treatment with NT as a potential therapeutic option.