Neuroscience letters
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Neuroscience letters · Nov 2017
Subsequent maternal separation exacerbates neurobehavioral abnormalities in rats neonatally exposed to sevoflurane anesthesia.
Several recent studies suggest that in the human population, a routine, short anesthetic in otherwise healthy infants is void of neurodevelopmental insult. On the other hand, many human retrospective epidemiological studies report evidence of cognitive abnormalities in children after testing those who had different anesthesia-requiring procedures in early childhood. We tested in a rat model whether post-anesthesia stressful environmental factors can contribute to developmental abnormalities that were initiated by a relatively short exposure to sevoflurane, the most widely used anesthetic in pediatric anesthesia, whose polyvalent actions include enhancement of gamma-aminobutyric acid type A receptor (GABAAR) activity. ⋯ Bumetanide ameliorated abnormalities induced by sevoflurane and a combination of sevoflurane plus maternal separation. Neonatal exposure to sevoflurane may sensitize to stressors later in life, and post-exposure stress may exacerbate neurodevelopmental abnormalities even after a relatively short exposure to sevoflurane in rodents. The NKCC1 downregulation prior to exposure to the anesthetic may be therapeutic.