Table 2.

Summary of studies of mice and/or rats as a model for neuropathic pain and effects of statin drugs [59, 63, 65–69]

Study	Neuropathy induction	Drugs	Tests	Results	Conclusions
Ciric 2018	High-fat diet to induce type 2 diabetes and metabolic syndrome	Metformin and simvastatin	Ultrastructural characteristics of sciatic nerve fibers	Structural defects in myelin sheath found and increased with metformin used but decreased with simvastatin	Simvastatin appeared to have beneficial effects on myelin structure of the sciatic nerve in this model
Corso 2018	Sciatic nerve crush	Simvastatin 20 and 80 mg/kg or morphine 1 h before 2.5% formalin injection	Mechanical pain; Cold allodynia; Nerve function	Simvastatin (2 and 80 mg/kg) reduce inflammatory pain caused by formalin but did not reduce edema in the paw; Simvastatin showed neuroprotective effects	Oral simvastatin reduced pain and inflammation; both lower and higher doses effective
Jabeen 2011	Obese rats, some fed high-fat diet, others a normal diet	Simvastatin	Conduction velocity of sciatic nerve	Obese rats had decreased nerve conduction velocity vs. controls; Conduction velocity was improved in all rats by simvastatin	Simvastatin improved sciatic nerve conduction in obese and lean animals and this improvement could be enhanced with co-administration of alpha-tocopherol
Ii 2005	Type 2 diabetes	Rosuvastatin	Sciatic nerve conduction velocity; Tail-flick test; Sciatic nerve collection	Rosuvastatin reduced pain, inhibited downregulation of neuronal nitric oxide synthase	Rosuvastatin had beneficial effect on diabetic neuropathy independent of its cholesterol-reducing effects
Li 2018	L5 spinal nerve transection	Rosuvastatin; morphine	Spinal cord collection	Five days of rosuvastatin restored nociception by morphine significantly and inhibited IL-1β	Rosuvastatin is effective in treating neuropathic pain
Miranda 2018 Murine	Paclitaxel Partial sciatic nerve ligation	Rosuvastatin	Cold plate Hot plate Von Frey assays Changes in spinal cord levels of IL-1β	Paclitaxel and partial sciatic nerve ligation induced peripheral neuropathy in 7–14 days Rosuvastatin induced a dose-dependent antinociception with all three tests and increased IL-1β and glutathione were reduced by rosuvastatin	Rosuvastatin was effective in reducing neuropathic pain in this model
Pathak 2014	Chronic constriction injury	Atorvastatin	Pain behaviors; markers for oxidative stress in sciatic nerve	Oxidative stress on sciatic nerve was inhibited	Atorvastatin attenuated neuropathic pain