Intermittent Hypoxia Elicits Prolonged Restoration of Motor Function in Human SCI.

摘要

This research is part of a concurrent set of studies involving animals and human spinal cord-injured (SCI) subjects designed to test the effects of a novel therapy, termed acute intermittent hypoxia (AIH), on voluntary limb function following chronic SCI. The current research investigates the effect of AIH treatment in a rat model of cervical SCI. Over the 2 years of this study, we have determined that AIH, in combination with daily motor training in the form of a ladder-walking task, elicits sustained improvement in skilled limb use during ladder walking task in a rat model of SCI when compared to normoxia-treated, motor-trained control rats. In a separate experiment, spinal-injured rats treated with AIH without concomitant motor training did not show recovery on the ladder task. As well, it appears the motor training must be task-specific, in that rats receiving AIH in combination with treadmill training did not show functional recovery on the ladder walking task. We also report that AIH does not facilitate recovery of grip strength or spontaneous forepaw use. These findings are important because they reveal that we can obtain consistent effects in an animal model for a promising SCI therapy. This therapy is also feasible, in that AIH has already been shown to augment motor function in persons with SCI.