Trichinella Infection Ameliorated Vincristine-Induced Neuroinflammation in Mice

Vincristine (VCR) is a chemotherapeutic agent widely used in treatment of malignancies. However, VCR has a limitation in use since it commonly causes a painful neuropathy (VCR-induced peripheral neuropathy, VIPN). Inflammatory cytokines secreted by immune cells such as macrophages can exacerbate allodynia and hyperalgesia, because inhibiting the inflammatory response is a treatment target for VIPN. In this study, we investigated whether Trichinella spiralis, a wide-ly studied helminth for its immunomodulatory abilities, can alleviate VCR-induced allodynia. Von Frey test showed that T. spiralis infection improved mechanical allodynia at 10 days after VCR injection. We further observed whether the differ-ence was due to mitigated axon degeneration, but no significant difference between the groups in axonal degeneration in sciatic nerves and intra-epidermal nerve fibers was found. Conversely, we observed that number of infiltrated macro-phages was decreased in the sciatic nerves of the T. spiralis infected mice. Moreover, treatment of T. spiralis excretory -se-cretory products caused peritoneal macrophages to secrete decreased level of IL-1 beta. This study suggests that T. spiralis can relieve VCR-induced mechanical allodynia by suppressing neuroinflammation and that application of controllable de-gree of helminth may prove beneficial for VIPN treatment.