Postinjury Treatment with Magnesium Chloride Attenuates Cortical Damage after Traumatic Brain Injury in Rats

• DOI: 10.1089/neu.2000.17.1029
• Publication Date: 2009-01-29T18:32:22Z
• Authors: FLORENCE M. BAREYRE; KATHRYN E. SAATMAN; RAMESH RAGHUPATHI; TRACY K. MCINTOSH
• Keywords: Sham surgery; Brain damage

The neuroprotective effect of magnesium chloride (MgCl2), a compound previously demonstrated to improve behavioral and neurochemical outcome in several models experimental brain injury, was evaluated the present study. Male Sprague–Dawley rats were anesthetized subjected lateral fluid-percussion injury moderate severity (2.5–2.8 atm). A cannula implanted left femoral vein at 1 h following animals randomly received 15 min i.v. infusion either MgCl2 (125 μmol/rat) or saline. second group anesthesia, surgery, vehicle serve as uninjured (sham) controls. Two weeks sacrificed, brains removed, coronal sections taken for quantitative analysis cortical lesion volume hippocampal CA3 cell counts. Traumatic resulted ipsilateral cortex loss pyramidal neurons region hippocampus vehicle-treated (p < 0.01 vs. animals). Administration significantly reduced injury-induced damage 0.01) but did not alter posttraumatic hippocampus. study demonstrates that, addition its beneficial effects on outcome, treatment attenuates histological when administered traumatic injury.