Late manifested sequelae of medications in the critical periods of development: The widening of the faulty hormonal imprinting conception

Abstract

Hormonal imprinting is a physiological process, which is a part of the receptorhormone complex development. It determines the binding capacity of the receptors across the lifespan. It takes place perinatally in the critical period of hormone receptor development, when the developmental window for imprinting is open and permits the binding of hormonelike molecules (related or synthetic hormones, endocrine disruptors etc.) causing disturbances of the endocrine system, and the systems influenced organs by it, for life. This is the faulty hormonal imprinting. However, studying the medical database, PubMed, a lot of data can be found on the harmful late (adult age) effects of medication in the critical period of development with nonhormonal molecules, which are manifested later in functional alterations or diseases. This could mean that in the process of faulty imprinting, the openness of the developmental window could be more important than the structural similarity of a molecule to hormones. As developmentally critical period for faulty imprinting by hormonelike molecules is not exclusively the perinatal one (this is justified in the case of faulty hormonal imprinting), the pubertal period was also studied from this aspect and similarities to the impact of perinatal use have been found (this could be called “Pubertal Origin of Health and Disease = POHaD). While in the case of hormonal faulty imprinting, the mechanism seems to be clear (considering the role of receptors), the mechanism of drugprovoked imprinting is presently uncleared (considering the variety of medications which cause latemanifested alterations). The medicamentscaused faulty imprinting conception calls attention to the dangers of medication in the perinatal as well as the pubertal periods.