The Role of Cholinergic System Damage in Traumatic Brain Injury

Convergent evidence from human autopsy studies of traumatic brain injury (TBI), animal models of TBI, and patterns of cognitive impairment after TBI suggests that there is cholinergic involvement in this cognitive impairment. These authors hypothesized that a sufficiently sensitive measure would demonstrate specific injury to cholinergic structures in the basal forebrain after TBI and that the basal injury would correlate with cognitive deficits. They used a computerized test battery (CANTAB) that is sensitive to attention, memory, and speed of information processing to evaluate 31 patients with moderate-to-severe TBI at least 6 months after injury and 32 uninjured controls. They also used voxel based morphometry (VBM) to identify affected …