The Combination Of Rtms And Pharmacotherapy On In Vitro Models: A Mini Review.

BACKGROUND: Repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) is a non-invasive brain stimulation technique which is being actively explored as a potential therapeutic modality in various neuropsychiatric disorders, such as depression, neuropathic pain, epilepsy, multiple sclerosis and neurodegenerative disorders, including Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved rTMS for the treatment of major depression, migraine associated headaches and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD). The fact that a significant proportion of patients suffering from these disorders fail to respond to current pharmacological interventions, indicates the need for alternative therapies like rTMS. OBJECTIVE: Our objective was to find and summarize all studies combining the use of rTMS and pharmacological interference on in vitro studies in order to facilitate future studies. METHODS: We focused on results from studies combining the use of rTMS with pharmacological interference in vitro. We have searched the PubMed database using the search terms ''rTMS'', ''repetitive'', ''transcranial'', ''magnetic'', ''stimulation'', ''in vitro'', ''in vivo'', ''cell cultures'' for a period extending from until March 2019 and found 7 eligible studies. RESULTS: Overall results show a synergistic effect of rTMS and pharmacotherapy in vitro with additive effectiveness, better prognosis and superior potential management. CONCLUSION: The limited amount of knowledge denotes the need for additional in vitro studies on the combination of rTMS and pharmacotherapy, which could be extended to in vivo studies and ultimately inform the design of clinical trials so as to improve the therapeutic management of patients with a wide array of neuropsychiatric disorders.