Anti-Tuberculosis Drug-Induced Hepatotoxicity: A Review

Hepatotoxicity, a serious adverse drug reaction in tuberculosis (TB) patients receiving anti-TB drugs, is one of the most challenging clinical problems worldwide. Despite increasing awareness of clinicians and public, even now it remains an enormous problem and causes of hospitalization and life-threatening events. Considering the importance of anti-TB drug-induced hepatotoxicity (DIH) as a major obstacle to achieve successful treatment of TB, this review article deals with the current understanding of anti-TB-DIH, its incidence, mechanism of liver damage induced by different anti-TB drugs and various risk factors responsible for anti-TB-DIH, which might provide suitable information for future studies to develop safer treatment for TB. Further, this review article focuses on the role of oxidative stress in the pathogenesis of anti-TB-DIH. In addition, the possible involvement of genetic polymorphism of drug metabolizing enzymes with respect to anti-TB-DIH is also discussed in this review.