Modulation of Invading and Resident Inflammatory Cell Activation as a Novel Way to Mitigate Spinal Cord Injury-Associated Neuropathic Pain
Abstract
Experiments completed during the project period were designed to test the hypothesis that the non-psychoactive cannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD) would attenuate spinal cord injury neuropathic pain (SCI-NP) and associated inflammatory markers, and that these protective effects would extend to exacerbating effects of morphine or alcohol exposure on SCI-NP. Our findings from Year 1 demonstrated that CBD treatment attenuates the development of SCI-NP but did not lead to an improvement in locomotor or bladder function. Unlike our original hypothesis, CBD did not have profound effects on microglial activation or on the overall expression of microglial markers, especially those that may promote an anti-inflammatory phenotype. Instead, experiments point to a robust effect of CBD on markers of T cell activation and migration, and a decrease in infiltrating T cells into the injured cord. In Year 2 we determined that morphine exacerbated locomotor and bladder function and that these effects were not counteracted by CBD treatment, although again CBD treatment decreased SCI-NP and T cell infiltration. Lastly in Year 3, we determined that ethanol exposure led to circulating inflammatory markers in the blood and that select inflammatory plasma markers were reduced following CBD treatment.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Sep 01, 2017
- Accession Number
- AD1048467
Entities
People
- Sara J. Ward
Organizations
- Temple University