Ormaplatin resistance is associated with decreased accumulation of its platinum (II) analogue, dichloro(D,L-trans)1,2-diaminocyclohexaneplatinum (II).

Ormaplatin (also known as tetraplatin) is a platinum-containing analogue which has recently undergone clinical trials. Ormaplatin may undergo conversion to dichloro(D,L-trans)-1,2-diaminocyclohexaneplatinum(II) [P1Cl2(trans-dach)]. The cisplatin-resistant murine lymphoma cell lines E8 and E5, were found to be cross-resistant to ormaplatin and PtCl2(trans-dach). We found an inverse rank correlation between drug resistance and drug accumulation for PtCl2(trans-dach) similar to our previous findings with cisplatin; however, accumulation of ormaplatin in the resistant cells was increased. Ormaplatin cytotoxicity appears to result primarily from extracellular conversion to PtCl2(trans-dach), since ormaplatin cytotoxicity was decreased under conditions where extracellular conversion to PtCl2(trans-dach) was minimised. Co-incubation with different inhibitors of energy metabolism resulted in a 65-70% increase in PtCl2(trans-dach) accumulation in the parental cell line R1.1 and a 113-307% increase in the resistant cell line E5 which suggests that the decrease in accumulation in E5 may be at least partly energy dependent. We conclude from these findings that cross-resistance to ormaplatin is associated with an energy-dependent decreased accumulation of PtCl2(trans-dach) in these cisplatin-resistant cell lines.