Penehyclidine hydrochloride suppressed peripheral nerve injury-induced neuropathic pain by inhibiting microglial MAPK/p-p38/IL-1β pathway activation

Background Millions of people suffered from neuropathic pain, which is related to neuroinflammation in the central nervous system. Penehyclidine hydrochloride is a premedication of general anesthesia, which has been confirmed possessing neuroprotective effects against various neurodegenerative or neuroinflammatory diseases. However, it is not clear that whether penehyclidine hydrochloride could suppress neuropathic pain through its anti-neuroinflammatory effects. Methods This study investigated the effects of penehyclidine hydrochloride on rat spinal nerve ligation injury-induced neuropathic pain with behavioral, morphological, and molecular biological methods in animals. Results The results indicated that penehyclidine hydrochloride could attenuate spinal nerve ligation-induced neuropathic pain without any motor impairment and had no effect on sham-operated animals after repeated intraperitoneal administration. Intraperitoneal penehyclidine hydrochloride could suppress spinal nerve ligation-induced ipsilateral spinal dorsal horn microglial activation with downregulation of OX42 expression. Moreover, intraperitoneal penehyclidine hydrochloride inhibited spinal nerve ligation-induced spinal p-p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase expression, which was specially colocalized with the spinal dorsal horn microglia. Furthermore, intraperitoneal penehyclidine hydrochloride could depress spinal neuroinflammation by suppressing spinal nerve ligation-induced interleukin (IL)-1 beta over-expression. Conclusion These results indicated that the anti-allodynic effects of penehyclidine hydrochloride on spinal nerve ligation-induced neuropathic pain did not rely on motor impairment. Inhibiting spinal microglial p-p38/IL-1 beta pathway activation might contribute to the anti-allodynic effect of penehyclidine hydrochloride on nerve injury-induced neuropathic pain.