Abbreviated environmental enrichment enhances neurobehavioral recovery comparably to continuous exposure after traumatic brain injury.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Environmental enrichment (EE) is a complex living milieu that has been shown to enhance functional recovery versus standard (STD) housing after experimental traumatic brain injury (TBI) and therefore may be considered a rodent correlate of rehabilitation. However, the typical EE paradigm consists of continuous exposure to enrichment after TBI, which is inconsistent with the limited time frame in clinical rehabilitation. OBJECTIVE: To determine whether abbreviated EE (ie, rehabilitation-relevant dose response) confers benefits similar to typical EE after TBI. METHODS: Adult male rats received either a controlled cortical impact (2.8 mm depth at 4 m/s) or sham injury and were then randomly assigned to TBI + EE, TBI + EE (2 hours), TBI + EE (4 hours), TBI + EE (6 hours), TBI + STD, and respective sham controls. Motor (beam balance/beam walk) and cognitive (Morris water maze) performance was assessed on postoperative days 1 to 5 and 14 to 19, respectively. RESULTS: The TBI + EE (2 hours) and TBI + EE (4 hours) groups were not statistically different from the TBI + STD group in any behavioral assessment. In contrast, the TBI + EE (6 hours) group exhibited significant enhancement of motor and cognitive performance when compared with the TBI + STD group, as well as the TBI + EE (2 hours) and TBI + EE (4 hours) groups (P < .003), and did not differ from the TBI + EE (typical) group. CONCLUSIONS: These data demonstrate that abbreviated EE (6 hours) produces motor and cognitive benefits similar to continuous EE after TBI and thus may be considered a dose-relevant rehabilitation paradigm.