status of total antioxidant capacity and malondialdehyde level in methamphetamine addicts: a cross sectional study

background : methamphetamine (ma) is an illegal amphetamine-like which stimulate the central nervous system. in recent years, ma has been widely abused worldwide. previous studies have suggested that oxidative stress (os) plays an important role in ma-induced toxicity. from this view, antioxidant therapy could be considered as a potential drug therapy in ma abusers. therefore, the objective of this study was to evaluate os status in ma abusers. methods: this was a cross-sectional study conducted on 21 ma abusers who referred to iranian national center for addiction studies and congress 60 humane revivification society, and 15 healthy males as a control group. the demographic data and peripheral blood sampling was obtained from both groups. the serum malondialdehyde (mda) level as a marker of plasma lipid peroxidation and total antioxidant capacity (tac) of plasma were analyzed. results: significant decrease in plasma tac in case group was observed (101.85±12.5 vs . 130.7±16.12 mmol/l). no significant increase in mda serum level was detected in case group in comparison with control (27.35±2.6 vs . 26.67±2.22 µmol/l, respectively). neither the serum mda levels nor the plasma tac were significantly correlated with the duration and amount of ma abuse. conclusion: it seems that, ma abuse is associated with prooxidant-antioxidant imbalance, which suggests evaluation the role of antioxidants administration for the prevention and treatment of ma-induced toxicity.