BACKGROUND Cardiac toxicity is the foremost reason for drug discontinuation from development to clinical evaluation and post market surveillance [Fung 35:293-317, 2001; Piccini 158:317-326 2009]. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has rejected many potential pharmaceutical agents due to QT prolongation effects. Since drug development and FDA approval takes an enormous amount of time, money ...

LESSONS LEARNED Cardiotoxicity can be a serious complication of anticancer therapies. To enable earlier identification of drug-related cardiac effects, the International Conference on Harmonization (ICH) adopted the ICH E14 Guidelines for evaluating the potential for QT/corrected QT (QTc) interval prolongation and proarrhythmic potential for nonantiarrhythmic drugs.The results of the evaluation...

Patients with QT prolongation have delayed cardiac repolarization and may suffer fatal ventricular arrhythmias. To determine the role of cytokines in causing this syndrome, we reviewed reports on patients with rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis and other inflammatory conditions. These patients frequently have prolonged QT, which correlates with increases in tumor necrosis factor alpha, and interle...

BACKGROUND Citalopram is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor that requires routine cardiac monitoring to prevent a toxic dose. Prolongation of the QT interval has been observed in acute citalopram poisoning. Our previous experimental study showed that citalopram may be lead to QT prolongation by stimulating adenosine A1 receptors without affecting the release of adenosine. AIMS We examin...

BACKGROUND Sevoflurane and droperidol prolong the QT interval, and advancing age is not only associated with a prolongation of the QT interval but is also a risk factor for drug-induced QT interval prolongation. In this study, we compared the effect of sevoflurane and droperidol on the corrected QT (QTc) interval and the dispersion of ventricular repolarization (time interval from the peak to t...

Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, or stress-induced cardiomyopathy, is characterized by reversible left ventricular apical ballooning associated with emotional or physiologic stress, mimicking acute myocardial infarction in the absence of significant coronary artery disease at angiography. Although the prognosis for patients with Takotsubo cardiomyopathy is relatively good, it is reported to be associa...

Sudden unexplained/unexpected death (SUDEP) in epilepsy is a major cause of death accounting for 7-17% of the mortality among epileptic patients. Prolongation of QT-interval has been issued as a major mechanism in SUDEP since it is associated with fatal cardiac arrhythmias. This condition may be further precipitated by anti-epileptic treatment. Despite thorough literature research, we did not f...

Introduction Life-threatening arrhytmias, including torsades de pointes and ventricular fibrillation, may be induced by corrected QT (QTc) interval prolongation. Several antimicrobial drugs have been associated with QTc interval prolongation [1,2]. Favipiravir is an inhibitor of the RNA-dependent RNA polymerase of many RNA viruses, including influenza viruses, arenaviruses, phleboviruses, hanta...