Abstract
Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is a debilitating but extremely common form of brain injury that affects a substantial number of people each year. mTBI is especially common in children and adolescents. Our understanding of mTBI pathophysiology is limited, and there is currently no accepted marker for disease severity. A potential marker for disease severity may be cerebrovascular dysfunction. Recent findings have implicated cerebrovascular alteration as an important component of mTBI and suggest it contributes to the development of persistent, long-term symptoms. In this paper, we conducted two studies to investigate whether mTBI affects venous drainage patterns in the central nervous system using alterations in the size of venous sinuses as a marker of changes in drainage. Using a closed head vertical weight-drop model and a lateral impact injury model of mTBI, we imaged and quantified the size of three major draining vessels in the adolescent rat brain using 9.4T MRI. Areas and volumes were quantified in the superior sagittal sinus and left and right transverse sinuses using images acquired from T2w MRI in one study and post-gadolinium T1w MRI in another. Our results indicated that the three venous sinuses were significantly larger in mTBI rats as compared to sham rats 1-day post injury but recovered to normal size 2 weeks after. Acutely enlarged sinuses post-mTBI may indicate abnormal venous drainage, and this could be suggestive of a cerebrovascular response to trauma.
Highlights
Mild traumatic brain injury is one of the most common forms of acute brain injury, affecting an estimated 42 million people each year [1, 2]
Similar results were seen in Study 2, with the time-toright for Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) rats being 84 ± 18 s, and sham rats being 37 ± 16 s (p = 9.5 × 10−8)
The sagittal sinus (SSS) volume was significantly increased in mTBI rats as compared to sham rats, with values at 4.0 ± 1.2 and 2.6 ± 0.19 mm3, respectively (p = 0.024) (Figure 3)
Summary
Mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) is one of the most common forms of acute brain injury, affecting an estimated 42 million people each year [1, 2]. This is especially a problem for children and adolescents [3, 4], as mTBIs that occur during critical periods of brain development may lead to long-term neurological symptoms [5]. There is no accepted method of detecting mTBI with imaging Both structural and vascular related studies have shown promise [8,9,10]. It is important to fully understand the pathophysiology of mTBI due to the complexity of mTBI, the need for biomarkers, and the quest for treatment options
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