Background: Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) are widely prescribed analgesics, but their teratogenic potential remains understudied. Dexketoprofen trometamol (DT), commonly used clinically, lacks sufficient data con-cerning fetal skeletal development safety. This study investigated the effects of DT on tibial growth and growth plate structure in chicken embryos. Methods: The experiment had two phases. Initially, embryos were administered either saline solution (control) or 0.084 mg/0.1 mL DT. In the second phase, embryos were divided into five groups: minimum DT dose (0.042 mg), maximum DT dose (0.126 mg), double maximum dose (0.252 mg), alcohol control, and saline control. Eggs were incubated for seven days before morphometric and histopathological analyses. Statistical tests included Fisher's exact test, one-way ANOVA, and Kruskal–Wallis analysis.Results: In phase one, embryo viability at day 7 showed no significant difference between DT and control groups. In the second phase, embryos receiving minimum and maximum DT doses demonstrated improved developmental outcomes compared to the double maximum dose and control groups. Specifically, crown–rump lengths significantly increased in the maximum dose compared to the double maximum group (p=0.015). Tibial lengths were also superior in the maxi-mum dose group compared to saline controls. Growth plate proliferative zone cell counts were higher in minimum and maximum dose groups versus controls, notably exceeding the double maximum dose group. No significant changes appeared in tibia diameter, ossification center length, or hypertrophic zone cell counts.Conclusion: DT showed no harmful impact on chicken embryo tibial development at the adult recommended dose in viable embryos. These findings also provide insight into the potential risk of embryotoxic effects of DT, particularly at supratherapeutic exposure levels where growth-related endpoints were less favorable. However, further molecular and clinical investigations are necessary.
Yıldız et al. (2026) studied this question.