Gestational Medication and Unpredictable Cancer Development in Offspring

There are critical developmental periods of life (the most determining is the perinatal one), when exposure to certain hormone-like molecules can reprogram the developmental program (methylation pattern), provoking late-manifested diseases and different alterations in the endocrine or endocrine-regulated systems. This is the faulty hormonal imprinting when for example endocrine disruptors, whilst behave as functional teratogens, transform the developmental program for life. However, in the last time publications appeared showing that not only hormones or hormone-like molecules (endocrine disruptors), but non-hormone drugs also can lifelong disturb the normality of program, causing late manifested diseases [developmental origin of health and disease (DOHaD)] onthe basis of hormonal imprinting. In the present article such drugs named„medigrammers” by us, are introduced, which after gestational employment provoked late (childhood or adult) tumor formation and the possible mechanism of their effects (reprogramming) is discussed.

Keywords: Drugs, faulty imprinting, perinatal period, developmental program, reprogramming, late effects.