Neurobehavioral Assessments of Subarachnoid Hemorrhage - Animal Models of Acute Neurological Injuries: Injury and Mechanistic Assessments - page 414

Chapter 31
Neurobehavioral Assessments of Subarachnoid Hemorrhage
Hidenori Suzuki and John H. Zhang
Abstract
The primary cause of poor outcome after subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) consists of many factors including
cerebral vasospasm and early brain injury. Animal studies usually focus on one factor among them, and the
difference in endpoints may cause lack of translation of treatments effective in animals to humans. Thus,
functional outcome has become a key parameter to determine the effi cacy of therapeutic interventions.
The neurological scoring system reported by Garcia et al. with or without a modifi cation has been most
widely used to investigate early pathophysiological changes after SAH. The scale consists of six tests
(spontaneous activity, spontaneous movement of all four limbs, forepaw outstretching, climbing, body
proprioception, and response to whisker stimulation) and is scored 2-18. This chapter introduces a brief
history, methods, and variations of the modifi ed Garcia's scale.
Key words: Mouse, Neurobehavior, Rat, Stroke, Subarachnoid hemorrhage
1. Introduction
Outcome of aneurysmal subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) remains
poor, and existing evidence suggests that many factors including
the elevation of intracranial pressure, global ischemia, disruption
of the blood-brain barrier, brain edema formation, activation of
infl ammatory or cell death pathways, and cortical spreading
depression as well as vasospasm cause poor outcome ( 1, 2 ). Most
of animal studies focus on only one or a few factors among them,
whose improvement does not necessarily lead to the improvement
of functional outcome. This is because the relative importance of
each causative factor is variable depending on the animal model
( 3 ). The difference in endpoints may cause lack of translation of
treatments effective in animals to humans. Thus, neurobehavioral
assessments as a measure for the whole brain function are neces-
sary to evaluate the effi cacy of therapeutic interventions after SAH.