Development of and pilot results from a large animal study to measure cerebrospinal fluid pressure before, during and after spinal cord injury

Jones, C. F.; Kwon, B. K.; Itshayek, E.; Markez, J.; Dennison, C.; Singlehurst, D.; Wild, P.; Cripton, P. A.

Affiliations

¹Injury Biomechanics Lab

²Division of Orthopaedic Engineering Research, Departments Mechanical Engineering and Orthopaedics, University of British Columbia

³ICORD, University of British Columbia

⁴University of Victoria

⁵Vancouver General Hospital

Abstract

The mechanical interactions between cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), spinal cord and dura associated with spinal cord injury (SCI) are not well understood. A better understanding of these interactions is important to develop, and define current limitations of animal, synthetic and computational models of SCI. Furthermore, CSF drainage to increase spinal cord tissue perfusion in patients immediately after an acute SCI is currently being assessed at our institution; however, CSF pressures cranial to the SCI site cannot be measured in patients. In this study we developed an in vivo large animal model to quantify CSF pressures experienced during an acute SCI, and to quantify CSF pressure variation cranially and caudally in the hours following SCI with a sustained complete subarachnoid occlusion and subsequent decompression. Four of the six pigs tested received a spinal cord injury. The peak pressures observed during SCI (range 6.2-19.7 mmHg) were greater than baseline pressure pulsations coupled with respiration (maximum peak-peak 5 mmHg), but less than the previously published result for a single cat SCI (50 mmHg, Hung et al., 1975). Two animals were of suitable condition to continue post-injury monitoring for two hours. The cranial and caudal CSF pressures both tended to decrease after injury in the presence of a complete subarachnoid occlusion. Following decompression, cranial CSF pressure increased and caudal pressure decreased. These trends were not as expected and may be due to physiological responses associated with the spinal cord injury or anaesthesia. This pilot study has provided valuable data, methodology, and experience which will be built upon in the continuation of our research program.

Cited By (1)

Year	Entry
2008	Dennison CRS. Development and Application of in-Fibre Bragg Grating Based Biomedical Pressure Sensors [Master's thesis]. University of Victoria; July 2008.