Medication induced Mitochondrial Damage and Disease

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Medication-induced mitochondrial damage and disease

Neustadt and Steve R. Pieczenik

Montana Integrative Medicine, Bozeman, MT, USA

Mol. Nutr. Food Res. 2008, 52, 780 – 788

http://psychrights.org/research/Digest/NLPs/DrugsCauseMitochondrialDamage.pdf

Since the first mitochondrial dysfunction was described in the 1960s, the

medicine has advanced in

its understanding the role mitochondria play in health and disease. Damage to

mitochondria is now

understood to play a role in the pathogenesis of a wide range of seemingly

unrelated disorders such as

schizophrenia, bipolar disease, dementia, Alzheimer's disease, epilepsy,

migraine headaches, strokes,

neuropathic pain, Parkinson's disease, ataxia, transient ischemic attack,

cardiomyopathy, coronary

artery disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, retinitis pigmentosa,

diabetes, hepatitis C,

and primary biliary cirrhosis. Medications have now emerged as a major cause of

mitochondrial damage,

which may explain many adverse effects. All classes of psychotropic drugs have

been documented to damage mitochondria, as have stain [sic: statin] medications,

analgesics such as acetaminophen, and many others. While targeted nutrient

therapies using antioxidants or their prescursors (e.g., N-acetylcysteine)

hold promise for improving mitochondrial function, there are large gaps in our

knowledge.

The most rational approach is to understand the mechanisms underlying

mitochondrial damage for

specific medications and attempt to counteract their deleterious effects with

nutritional therapies.

This article reviews our basic understanding of how mitochondria function and

how medications damage

mitochondria to create their occasionally fatal adverse effects.

Thimerosal also

24 citations in Pubmed via:

thimerosal AND mitochond*