Potential salvage therapy for accidental intrathecal vincristine administration: A preliminary experimental study

Background: Accidental intrathecal vincristine (VCR) administration results in severe neurotoxicity, usually fatal in outcome. No specific therapy for initrathecal VCR toxicity has been reported so far. In our recent report, complete in vitro degradation of VCR by hypochlorous acid (HOCl) was demons trated. Methods: In this comparative study, we examined the in vivo effecti vity of HOCl in the cerebrospinal fluid of 24 New Zealand rabbits following intracisternal VCR administration. Results: There were no significant clin ical or histopathologic abnormalities in the control and HOCl groups; howev er, multiple necrotic foci on histopathological examination of brain sectio ns in the VCR group were determined. There were significantly lower numbers of necrotic foci in brain sections of rabbits which received HOCl administ ration than those without therapy. Conclusion: Our results indicate that HO Cl may reduce VCR neurotoxicity. Copyright (C) 2000 S. Karger AG, Basel.