Funding outcome

Cisplatin is a chemotherapy agent that is highly effective in treating solid tumors in children. However, it also has led to permanent hearing loss in >50% of the treated children. Due to its toxicity, dosages must be lowered to lessen the burden of these side effects. As an indispensable drug in childhood cancer therapy, it is necessary to find a way to protect against hearing loss while administering this chemotherapeutic for improving both short term and long-term childhood cancer patient health outcomes. Permanent hearing loss has a wide range of impacts on the affected children. Learning and language development becomes increasingly difficult and impedes their interaction with peers; additionally, their social and emotional development is greatly affected. As adults, these survivors have been shown to face economic disadvantages. By investigating the method by which cisplatin causes hearing loss, we can potentially identify ways to prevent it so that life as a childhood cancer survivor does not have to be compromised by these severe side effects. Thus, finding safe therapies for this cisplatin-induced hearing loss is crucial to improving the quality of life of the children at risk. Research will be conducted on an infant inner ear cell line, which presents as a relevant model for cytotoxic effects on children's hearing. The effect that cisplatin treatment has on these cells will be measured and this will allow for close examination of cellular pathways involved to reveal targets that can be used for development of protectants to reduce incidence of cisplatin-induced hearing loss and improve long-term health outcomes for childhood cancer patients.