Analgesic effect of morphine and tramadol in standard toxicity assays in mice injected with venom of the snake Bothrops asper

Herrera, Cristina, Bolton, Fiona, Arias, Ana Silvia, Harrison, Robert and Gutierrez, Jose Maria (2018) 'Analgesic effect of morphine and tramadol in standard toxicity assays in mice injected with venom of the snake Bothrops asper'. Toxicon, Vol 154, pp. 35-41.

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Abstract

Routine laboratory animal tests necessary to assess the toxicity of snake venoms and the preclinical neutralizing ability of antivenoms and other inhibitory substances induce significant pain and distress. This has prompted initiatives to introduce the routine use of analgesia. In this study, the analgesic effect of morphine and tramadol was assessed in tests assessing the lethal, hemorrhagic, myotoxic and edema-forming activities of the venom of the viperid snake Bothrops asper. The Mouse Grimace Scale (MGS) and mouse-exploration activity were used to assess pain and its inhibition by the analgesics. Results demonstrate that tests assessing lethality and myotoxicity induce higher levels of pain than assays quantifying hemorrhagic and edema-forming activities. Our observations also indicate that pretreatment of mice with both analgesics, at the doses used, were similarly effective in reducing the MGS magnitude and increase mouse-exploration activity after the administration of B. asper venom. Moreover, the analgesic effect of both drugs was more evident in the myotoxic and lethality assays. Combined with previous observations showing that these analgesics do not alter the extent of toxic effects induced by B. asper venom, our results strongly indicate that the use of analgesia (using either morphine or tramadol) should be considered in the routine assessment of venom toxicity and antivenom efficacy.

Item Type:	Article
Subjects:	QS Anatomy > QS 4 General works. Classify here works on regional anatomy
Faculty: Department:	Biological Sciences > Department of Tropical Disease Biology
Digital Object Identifer (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.toxicon.2018.09.012
Depositing User:	Stacy Murtagh
Date Deposited:	09 Nov 2018 09:54
Last Modified:	27 Sep 2019 01:02
URI:	https://archive.lstmed.ac.uk/id/eprint/9585

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