High fat diet increases the incidence of orofacial dyskinesia and oxidative stress in specific brain regions of rats

Abstract

Haloperidol-induced orofacial dyskinesia (OD) is a putative animal model of tardive dyskinesia (TD) whose pathophysiology has been related to free radical generation and oxidative stress. Schizophrenic patients have been reported to eat a diet higher in fat than the general population and dietary fat intake can lead to an increase in oxidative stress in animal models. The objective of this study was to determine whether association of ingestion of a high fat diet with prolonged haloperidol treatment could lead to OD and oxidative stress in the rat brain. Haloperidol decanoate administration (38 mg/kg, IM, which is equivalent to 1 mg/kg/day) monthly for a period of 6 months to rats fed previously with a high fat and normo fat diets (6 months) caused a increase in vacuous chewing (VCM) and duration of facial twitching (FT). Haloperidol caused a reduction in body weight gain and the loss of body weight occurred after 4 months of treatment with haloperidol. The effects on body weight were more accentuated in HF diet group. HF diet ingestion was associated with an increase in TBARS levels in cerebellum and cerebral cortex (regardless of haloperidol treatment). A significant diet × haloperidol treatment interaction in striatum, subcortical parts and the region containing the substantia nigra was observed for TBARS. In fact, haloperidol caused an increase in TBARS levels of these regions only in rats fed with the HF. These results indicate that a high fat diet caused a transitory increase in haloperidol-induced OD in rats and this in part can be related to the haloperidol-induced oxidative stress in brain structures involved with OD.