Journal of North Khorasan

Abstract Backgroiund &Objectives: 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 Methods: 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. Results: 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) Conclusion: 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