Catechin attenuates traumatic brain injury-induced blood-brain barrier damage and improves longer-term neurological outcomes in rats.

What is the central question of this study? We investigated the potential neuroprotective effects of catechin after traumatic brain injury and explored the underlying mechanisms. What is the main finding and its importance? Catechin treatment had neuroprotective effects in a rat model of traumatic brain injury, and these effects might be mediated by intervention in the self-perpetuating process of blood-brain barrier disruption and excessive inflammatory reaction. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) resulting from external force on the head usually leads to long-term deficits in motor and cognitive functions. Catechin has shown neuroprotective effects in neurodegenerative diseases and ischaemia models. We therefore investigated the potential neuroprotective effects of catechin after TBI and explored the underlying mechanisms. Male rats were subjected to controlled cortical impact injury and then treated with catechin. Brain damage, motor and cognitive functions, blood-brain barrier (BBB) integrity and neuro-inflammation were examined. Catechin treatment ameliorated brain damage and motor and cognitive deficits after TBI. Catechin was shown to protect BBB integrity, alleviate the TBI-induced loss of the junction proteins occludin and zonula occludens protein-1 and suppress local inflammatory reactions. Catechin treatment had neuroprotective effects in a rat model of TBI, and these effects might be mediated by intervention in the self-perpetuating process of BBB disruption and excessive inflammatory reaction.