Impact of ellagic acid application on doxorubicin-induced cardiovascular toxicity model

Doxorubicin is an anticancer agent that is commonly used to treat a number of tumors and is associated with acute and chronic changes of the cardiovascular system. Ellagic acid has strong free radical scavenging capacity, neuroprotective and hepatoprotective effects, and is known to protect against changes occurring due to diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer. Twenty-four Wistar rats were divided in four groups: control group received saline, doxorubicin group received doxorubicin in a single dose of 20 mg/kg, ellagic acid group received ellagic acid in a dose of 4 mg/kg, and doxorubicin + ellagic acid group received doxorubicin and ellagic acid in same doses as in previous groups. The effect of ellagic acid treatment, alone or in combination with doxorubicin, was studied on isolated heart frequency and strength of the contraction, and on thoracic aorta contractile responses. Application of ellagic acid to rats pre-treated with doxorubicin significantly prevented functional changes occurring in the heart, but not in the thoracic aorta tissue. Ellagic acid statistically significantly (p < 0.001) prevented doxorubicin-induced increase in heart rate, while at the same time increased single contraction force (p < 0.001) and attenuated morphological changes on heart tissue induced by doxorubicin. We can conclude that ellagic acid has potential to prevent doxorubicin-induced changes of the cardiovascular system.