Neurotrophic factors attenuate alterations in spinal cord evoked potentials and edema formation following trauma to the rat spinal cord.

Influence of brain derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and insulin like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) on spinal cord injury induced disturbances in spinal cord conduction, edema formation and cellular stress response was examined in a rat model. Pretreatment with BDNF or IGF-1 significantly attenuated the loss of SCEP negative amplitude seen immediately after spinal cord injury. In these neurotrophins treated rats, upregulation of heat shock protein (HSP 72 kD) immunoreactivity, a measure of cellular stress response and spinal cord edema formation were considerably reduced 5 h after injury. These results suggest that neurotrophic factors improve spinal cord conduction after trauma and this beneficial effect of growth factors may be related with their ability to attenuate trauma induced cellular stress response, not reported earlier.