Assessment of behavioural recovery following spinal cord injury in rats

Abstract

Behavioural recovery is one of the primary goals of therapeutic intervention in animal models of disease. It is necessary, therefore, to have the means with which to quantify pertinent behavioural changes in experimental animals. Nevertheless, the number and diversity of behavioural measures which have been used to assess recovery after experimental interventions often makes it difficult to compare results between studies. The present review attempts to integrate and categorize the wide variety of behavioural assessments used to measure recovery in spinal-injured rats. These categories include endpoint measures, kinematic measures, kinetic measurements, and electrophysiological measurements. Within this categorization, we discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each type of measurement. Finally, we make some recommendations regarding the principles for a comprehensive behavioural analysis after experimental spinal cord injury in rats.

A robotic device for studying rodent locomotion after spinal cord injury

“…In addition, by systematically determining the maximum amount of load that an animal can bear and still step successfully, weight-support ability can be quantified [11]. Detailed kinematic features of hindlimb end-point movements, such as step length and height, swing and stance duration, and swing velocity can be obtained readily, and show potential for objective, quantitative impairment, and outcome assessment [1], [2], [12]. However, measurement of individual joint angles is not possible with the rat stepper.…”

Kinematics and Ground Reaction Force Determination: A Demonstration Quantifying Locomotor Abilities of Young Adult, Middle-aged, and Geriatric Rats

“…The authors recommend that experimenters enroll in a course dealing with introductory biomechanics, be familiar with or hire someone familiar with a programming language required for data management, and of equal importance, spend substantial time interacting, handling, and working with laboratory animals. For understanding locomotion analysis and sensorimotor behavioral analysis in the neurosciences, experimenters are referred to several important references (see 1,[4][5][6][7] ).…”

“…In the fields of neuroscience and orthopedics, locomotion is a commonly evaluated behavior for a variety of disease models. For example, locomotor recovery after traumatic injury to the nervous system is one of the most commonly evaluated behaviors [1][2][3] . Though locomotion can be evaluated using a variety of endpoint measurements (e.g.…”

“…Basso Beattie and Bresnahan locomotor (BBB) rating scale, etc)) and surrogate measures of behaviour (e.g. muscle force, nerve conduction velocity, etc), only kinetics (force measurements) and kinematics (measurements of body segments in space) provide a detailed description of the strategy by which an animal is able to locomote 1 . Though not new, kinematic and kinetic measurements of locomoting rodents is now more readily accessible due to the availability of commercially available equipment designed for this purpose.…”

Physiological methods to measure motor function in humans and animals with spinal cord injury

“…However, recovery of function, whether it occurs spontaneously or as a result of an intervention, is best understood when it is evaluated with a principled approach that includes different assessments (e.g., physiological, anatomical, behavioral) of both motor and sensory function. In this regard, other recent reviews provide important information on the motor neurobiology of the spinal cord, ways to restore motor function after injury, and behavioral assessments of functional recovery following SCI [1][2][3][4][5].…”