Spinal cord injury affects the heart – that’s what research published in Experimental Physiology and carried out by by ICORD PI Dr. Chris West has found.
The heart undergoes changes after spinal cord injury that are dependent on how severe the spinal cord injury is but only a small amount of “sparing” (i.e., a small number of nerve fibers preserved) in the spinal cord are necessary for the heart to function at a near normal level.
This research has important clinical implications as one of the primary aims of spinal cord injury management is to reduce the amount of damage that happens after the initial trauma. This exacerbation of the primary injury is termed the “secondary injury”, and is driven by complex cellular processes that eventually result in the ‘size’ of the injury enlarging and therefore damaging more nerve fibres. These findings imply that if more nerve fibres can be preserved following spinal cord injury (for example by reducing the extent of the secondary injury), then there could be improvements in how the heart functions. This is important as individuals with spinal cord injury are at a much higher risk for heart disease than people without spinal cord injury.
Dr. West and members of his lab
L-R: Dr. West, PhD student Jordan Squair, postdoc Malihe Pourmasjedi, postdoc Alex Williams, Masters student Mary Fossey, postdoc Adrian Alanis, PhD student Cameron Gee. [photo: Jannike Kitchen]
To read more about Dr. West’s research, see the Fall 2017 issue of the ICORDian Newsletter.
This media release was prepared by the Physiological Society, which brings together over 3,500 scientists from over 60 countries. The Society promotes physiology with the public and parliament alike. It supports physiologists by organising world-class conferences and offering grants for research and also publishes the latest developments in the field in its three leading scientific journals, The Journal of Physiology, Experimental Physiology and Physiological Reports. www.physoc.org
