1. Low-dose of benznidazole promotes therapeutic cure in experimental chronic Chagas' disease with absence of parasitism in blood, heart and colon
- Author
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Lívia M. Carvalho, Cláudia Martins Carneiro, Paula Melo de Abreu Vieira, Thais Vieira de Carvalho, João Vitor Madeira, Kátia da Silva Fonseca, Rodrigo Correa-Oliveira, Israel Molina, Luciana da Fonseca Medeiros, and Luísa Perin
- Subjects
0301 basic medicine ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Colon ,Trypanosoma cruzi ,030231 tropical medicine ,Immunology ,Chronic Chagas' disease ,Disease ,Real-Time Polymerase Chain Reaction ,Gastroenterology ,03 medical and health sciences ,Mice ,0302 clinical medicine ,Internal medicine ,medicine ,Animals ,Chagas Disease ,Cyclophosphamide ,Immunosuppression Therapy ,biology ,Treatment regimen ,Low dose ,Neglected Diseases ,Heart ,General Medicine ,030108 mycology & parasitology ,biology.organism_classification ,Trypanocidal Agents ,Treatment efficacy ,Infectious Diseases ,Blood ,Benznidazole ,Nitroimidazoles ,Acute Disease ,Chronic Disease ,Parasitology ,Female ,medicine.drug - Abstract
Studies suggest that the dose of the standard benznidazole (BNZ) treatment regimen might be too high. We investigated the efficacy of BNZ 20 and 40 mg/kg/day compared with standard dose (100 mg/kg/day) to induce cure in mice infected with Trypanosoma cruzi Y strain in the acute and chronic phases of Chagas' disease. Our findings indicate that an experimental treatment with a BNZ low-dose (40 mg/kg/day) is similarly effective as the usual dose in the chronic mice model (100% of cure). In addition, the treatment in the chronic model of Chagas' disease presented better results than the acute model and colon appears to be a key tissue when it comes to evaluating treatment efficacy compared to blood and heart. Therefore, our data suggest the reconsideration of the current therapy, mainly in the chronic phase of the disease.
- Published
- 2019