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the impact of r-mTBI on the cerebrovasculature by assessing BBB
integrity and examining specific vascular markers at various time-
points post-injury in upcoming studies.
Keywords: Animal Models, Cerebral Blood Flow, Laser Doppler
Imaging, hTau Mice, Closed-Head Injury
B1-04
AGING RELATED DIFFERENCES IN PATTERNS OF MEDI-
CATION USE AT TIME OF TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY
Amina Ramadan
2
, Hope Clark-Bell
1,2
, Adrienne James
1,2
, Christopher
Panks
1,2
,
Hilaire Thompson
1,2
1
The Univ. of Washington, Biobehavioral Nursing & Health Systems,
Seattle, USA
2
The Univ. of Washington, Harborview Injury Prevention and Re-
search Center, Seattle, USA
Background/Purpose:
The influence of comorbidities and medications
on injury rates and recovery in older adults with traumatic brain injury
(TBI) still remains largely unexplored. Elderly patients are often taking
several prescriptions at the time of injury, and there may be correlations
between the use of any number of medications and the incidence of
TBI. This project seeks to determine patterns of prescription medication
and supplement usage and among patients who have suffered a TBI.
Methods:
This was secondary data analysis of an ongoing pro-
spective cohort study (N
=
297). Cohorts include older (55 years of
age and above) and younger (
<
55) persons following mild TBI as well
as both older and younger non-injured age and gender-matched con-
trols. Medication use (to include both prescription and supplements) at
time of injury were obtained from medical records and self-report.
Medications were collapsed into 14 categories of common drug
classifications (e.g., beta-blockers, diuretics, vitamins, etc). De-
scriptive statistics and chi-squared analyses were performed to de-
termine cohort differences in medication use.
Results:
Older adults were more likely to be on at least one med-
ication at time of TBI (87%) than those in the younger injured cohort
(55%). Older adults with TBI were also more likely to be on any
medication than older adult controls (87 vs. 77%). Similar findings
were seen in younger TBI (55%) versus younger non-injured controls
(48%). The most common types of medications used in persons with
mild TBI were statins, aspirin and ACE inhibitors.
Conclusions:
This research has important implications for improved
injury prevention-related education of patients using these medications.
The increased drug usage, particularly those with vasoactive properties,
by the elderly places them at greater risk of injury and close monitoring
is warranted when prescribing or adjusting these medications.
Supported by NIH/NINDS R01NS077913
Keywords: medication; supplements; injury prevention
B1-05
AGING RATS SHOW ALTERATIONS TO GLIAL CELL AC-
TIVATION AND FUNCTIONAL RECOVERY AFTER SPINAL
CORD INJURY
Ramona Von Leden
, Guzal Khayrullina, Kimberly Byrnes
Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Anatomy,
Physiology, and Genetics, Bethesda, MD, USA
Spinal cord injury (SCI) among the aging population has been steadily
increasing since the 1980’s and is associated with high rates of co-
morbidities and delayed recovery. Increases in oxidative stress and re-
active oxygen species in aging tissue are suggested to increase the
activation of glial cells and lead to chronic inflammation, which may
contribute to the delayed recovery to SCI seen in the aging population.
This study aimed to determine the effect of age on glial cell activation
both basally and after SCI, and determine functional outcomes after
injury with aging. Briefly, young (3 months old) and aged (12 months
old) male rats were sacrificed and tissue was processed for histology to
determine basal glial activation states. Histology revealed increased
staining of markers for microglia (Iba1, p
=
0.0456) and astrocytes
(GFAP, p
=
0.0199) in naı¨ve tissue of aged animals compared to young
animals. To investigate locomotor function after injury, a second group
of young and aged male rats were subjected to a moderate contusion
SCI before being assessed through a locomotor battery. Locomotor
function was assessed once a week for 28 days using the Basso, Beattie,
and Breshnahan (BBB) scale, the ladder walk, and footprint analysis.
Functional analysis revealed that compared with young animals, aged
animals showed significantly reduced general motor function at 7 dpi
(p
<
0.001), significantly decreased toe spread (p
=
0.0231) and stride
length (p
=
0.0238) at 28 dpi, and a trend toward reduced performance
on the ladder task at both 14 and 28 dpi. These results demonstrate that
aged rats demonstrate increased basal glial activation and a worsened
functional outcome to injury, findings that are essential towards eluci-
dating the mechanisms of age-related differences in response to SCI.
Keywords: oxidative stress, microglia, astrocyte, functional recovery
B1-06
1H-MRS SUGGESTS MECHANISMS UNDERLYING POOR
RECOVERY AFTER INJURY TO THE AGED BRAIN
Janna Harris
1,2
, Hung-Wen Yeh
3
, Sandra Tye
1
, William Brooks
1,4,5
1
University of Kansas Medical Center, Hoglund Brain Imaging
Center, Kansas City, USA
2
University of Kansas Medical Center, Anatomy and Cell Biology,
Kansas City, USA
3
University of Kansas Medical Center, Biostatistics, Kansas City, USA
4
University of Kansas Medical Center, Molecular and Integrative
Physiology, Kansas City, USA
5
University of Kansas Medical Center, Neurology, Kansas City, USA
Traumatic brain injury (TBI) has an especially large impact on individuals
over the age of 65, who are more likely to be hospitalized, and have higher
mortality and poorer outcomes than younger adults. However, the reasons
for this discrepancy remain poorly understood. We used non-invasive
proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (
1
H-MRS) to explore potential
biological mechanisms in the aged brain that may account for the poor
recovery in older individuals with TBI.
1
H-MRS is a neuroimaging tech-
nique that measures neurochemicals (biomarkers) that reflect specific
aspects of brain function, for example, neuronal mitochondrial status
(N-acetylaspartate), oxidative stress (glutathione and ascorbate), neuro-
transmission (glutamate, aspartate, GABA), and edema (taurine,
myo
-
inositol). We administered TBI by controlled cortical impact to the right
sensorimotor cortex (2mm depth, 3.5m/s, 300ms) in young adult (3
month) and aged (20–22month) male rats. AVarian 9.4 Tesla systemwas
used to collect water-suppressed MR spectra (TE
=
2ms, TR
=
4000ms)
from the ipsilateral hippocampus before TBI, and after TBI at 1 hour and
1, 3, 7, 14, and 28 days. Sensorimotor function was measured with the
beam walk task over the same time course. We found that functional
impairment was significantly worse in the aged rats after TBI, reflecting
the poorer outcomes seen in older human survivors of TBI.
1
H-MRS
biomarker changes after injury were also more severe in the aged rats,
including a larger decrease in N-acetylaspartate, phosphocreatine, and
taurine, and a more prolonged decrease in glutamate compared with
younger adults. Our results indicate greater metabolic disturbances in the
aged injured brain, particularly in markers of bioenergetic impairment (n-
acetylaspartate, phosphocreatine), excitotoxicity (glutamate), and edema
A-44