Title:An Overview on Chemotherapy-induced Cognitive Impairment and Potential Role of Antidepressants
Volume: 18
Issue: 9
Author(s): Ankit Das, Niraja Ranadive, Manas Kinra, Madhavan Nampoothiri, Devinder Arora and Jayesh Mudgal*
Affiliation:
- Department of Pharmacology, Manipal College of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal 576104, Karnataka,India
Keywords:
Antidepressants, chemobrain, chemotherapy, cognitive impairment, cytokines, neuroinflammation.
Abstract:
Background: Cognitive impairment is an adverse reaction of cancer chemotherapy and is
likely to affect up to 75% of patients during the treatment and 35% of patients experience it for
several months after the chemotherapy. Patients manifest symptoms like alteration in working ability,
awareness, concentration, visual-verbal memory, attention, executive functions, processing
speed, fatigue and behavioural dysfunctions. Post-chemotherapy, cancer survivors have a reduced
quality of life due to the symptoms of chemobrain. Apart from this, there are clinical reports which
also associate mood disorders, vascular complications, and seizures in some cases. Therefore, the
quality of lifestyle of cancer patients/ survivors is severely affected and only worsens due to the
absence of any efficacious treatments. With the increase in survivorship, it’s vital to identify effective
strategies, until then only symptomatic relief for chemobrain can be provided. The depressive
symptoms were causally linked to the pathophysiological imbalance between the pro and antiinflammatory
cytokines.
Conclusion: The common causative factor, cytokines can be targeted for the amelioration of an
associated symptom of both depression and chemotherapy. Thus, antidepressants can have a beneficial
effect on chemotherapy-induced inflammation and cognitive dysfunction via cytokine balance.
Also, neurogenesis property of certain antidepressant drugs rationalises their evaluation against
CICI. This review briefly glances upon chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment (CICI), and
the modulatory effect of antidepressants on CICI pathomechanisms.