text: Compound Shown to Reduce Brain Damage Caused by Anesthesia in Animal Model | NYU Langone Health
  June 22, 2016 (2:00PM)
  An experimental drug prevented learning deficits in young mice exposed repeatedly to anesthesia, according to a study led by researchers from NYU Langone Medical Center and published as the cover story of Science Translational Medicine on June 22.
  The study results may have implications for children who must have several surgeries, and so are exposed repeatedly to general anesthesia. Past studies have linked such exposure to a higher incidence of learning disabilities, attention deficits, and hyperactivity.
  "Each year, in the United States alone, more than a million children under age four undergo surgical procedures that require anesthesia, and the numbers are growing," says the study's senior investigator Guang Yang, PhD, an assistant professor of anesthesiology at NYU Langone. "There are currently no effective treatments to combat potential toxicity linked to repeated anesthesia, and we would like to change that."
  Yang's group took advantage of genetically engineered young mice that have protein markers which glow in response to changes in nerve function. Researchers then used advanced microscopy to visualize activity in their brains, comparing nerve signaling activity in those exposed to anesthesia to those who were not.
  "We were able to counter anesthesia-induced deficits in the formation of connections between nerve cells and related learning problems," says Yang. "This work is an important proof-of-principle study, and opens the door to a new direction for preventing long-term neurocognitive deficits."