Combination of coumarin and doxorubicin induces drug-resistant acute myeloid leukemia cell death

BACKGROUND: Chemotherapy remains to be the method of choice used by clinicians to treat acute myeloid leukemia (AML) patients. However, the most common problem usually faced in the course of treatment is multidrug resistance (MDR). Nowadays, combination therapy involving natural products as adjuvant therapy to chemotherapy and radiotherapy has been used for many of health problems. Coumarin is a natural compound with known chemotherapeutic activity, as well as other pharmacological properties. We focused on the combination of coumarin and doxorubicin in overcoming of drug-resistance in acute myeloid leukemia. METHODS: Cell viability, Apoptotic and necrotic cell death with FACS, oxidative stress detection, and protein expression analysis were used in this study. RESULTS: Coumarin as a single drug exerts a significant cell death on Human acute myeloid leukemia (HL60); however, it does not show the same effect on drug-resistant acute myeloid leukemia (HL60/ADR). Comparing the effects of doxorubicin and coumarin as single drugs versus a combination of coumarin and doxorubicin showed a significant apoptotic cell death. CONCLUSION: In AML patients, the development of multiple drug resistance (MDR) is the biggest challenge in treating AML patients. Combination therapy with coumarin may be a good choice to overcome the drug resistance in AML patients.