Genetics in Neural Toxicities of Drugs

Adverse side effects or toxicities of a drug were previously regarded as a manifestation of drug's own characterizations, such as the chemical structure and property of a drug. More recently, increasing experimental or clinical data and modern ideas suggest that human's genetic factors also play indispensable roles in resulting neural side effects of a drug, especially in antidepressant-induced suicide and antibiotics-induced hearing loss. However, there are many questions and technological obstacles (including high costs and limited samples) in these kinds of researches and this makes genetic study of drug toxicities in its initial stage. In this review, we in depth address and analysis of this matter from some new perspectives and propose some new initiatives to improve this type of researches in future. It is also highly needed to expedite the translation of these pharmacogenetic concepts from bench to bedside.