Effects of chronic exposure to ketamine on Dentate Gyrus and CA3 regions of hippocampus

Backgroiund & Ketamine is one of the anesthetic drugs which is used in dissociative anesthesia. Psychotogeinic effect of ketamine with its resulted euphoria has made it as a psychotogenic abused drug. The aim of this study was to assess the effects of chronic exposure to ketamine on dentate gyrus and CA3 region of hippocampus. materaial and this study was carried out on 20 male wistar rats (4 weeks old 150-200gr) that were randomly divided into two groups namely experimental and control. Experimental group received ketamine interaperitonellay at dose of 10mg/kg for one week. At the end of week speciement were stained by cresyl violet and degenerated neurons were counted by modified stereological method. the count of dark neurons in granular layer of dentate gyrus of experimental group showed significant level of difference compare with control (p<0.001).The comparison between the dark neurons in pyramidal layer of CA3 region of experimental group showed significant difference with those of control group (P<0.001) the results of our study showed that chronic exposure to ketamine can accelerate neuronal death in granular cells of the dentate gyrus and pyramidal neurons of CA3 regions.