Sulfasalazine attenuates chronic constriction injury-induced neuroinflammation and mechanical hypersensitivity in rats

Publication date: Available online 31 July 2018Source: Neuroscience LettersAuthor(s): Longfei Ma, Hongmei Liu, Guowu Chen, Mingtai Chen, Lina Wang, Xu Zhang, Daiqiang Liu, Chunyang MengAbstractNeuropathic pain is a severe and chronic neurological disease caused by injury or disease of the somatosensory system. Currently, there are no effective treatments for neuropathic pain. Neuroinflammation, characterized by activation of spinal glial cells and increased production of pro-inflammatory cytokines (for example, IL-1β, TNF-α and IL-6), is a pathophysiological process closely related to neuropathic pain. The anti-inflammatory drug sulfasalazine (SFZ) is approved for inflammatory bowel disease and rheumatoid arthritis. Although the analgesic effect of SFZ has been reported in diabetic mice, its role in neuropathic pain caused by peripheral nerve injury has not been clarified. Here, we show that SFZ significantly alleviated mechanical hypersensitivity and attenuated neuroinflammatory response in neuropathic pain induced by chronic constriction injury (CCI) in rats. Additionally, SFZ inhibited the activation of astrocytes and abolished the CCI-induced increase of NF-κB in the spinal cord. Hence, our results show that SFZ is a potential treatment for neuropathic pain induced by peripheral nerve injury.
Source: Neuroscience Letters - Category: Neuroscience Source Type: research