Weber R A, Proctor W H, Warner M R, Verheyden C N
Division of Plastic Surgery, Scott & White Clinic, Temple, TX 76508.
Microsurgery. 1993;14(5):323-7. doi: 10.1002/micr.1920140507.
The rat sciatic nerve serves as a good model of nerve regeneration and, as such, is often used in investigations of nerve repair. After transection of the sciatic nerve, rodents frequently scratch and bite their anesthetic foot, resulting in amputation of one or more toes. This is termed autotomy or autophagy. When these rats are part of a study using the sciatic functional index (SFI), autotomy results in unusable data, since necessary foot landmarks have been removed. It would be helpful, therefore, to be familiar with the phenomenon of autotomy and to know which rats are least likely to mutilate themselves. In our experiment involving 64 rats in which the sciatic nerve was transected and repaired, we found that female Sprague-Dawley rats were significantly less likely to perform autotomy than males (33% vs. 65%, P = .04). In addition, we noted that two-thirds of the autotomies that occurred did so by postoperative week 4 and that tabasco sauce did not decrease this activity. We present our experience and a survey of the literature on autotomy and the SFI.
大鼠坐骨神经是神经再生的良好模型，因此常用于神经修复研究。坐骨神经横断后，啮齿动物经常抓挠和啃咬麻醉的足部，导致一个或多个脚趾被截断。这被称为自切或自残。当这些大鼠作为使用坐骨神经功能指数（SFI）的研究对象时，自切会导致数据无法使用，因为必要的足部标记已被去除。因此，熟悉自切现象并了解哪些大鼠最不可能自残会很有帮助。在我们涉及64只坐骨神经横断并修复的大鼠的实验中，我们发现雌性斯普拉格-道利大鼠进行自切的可能性明显低于雄性（33%对65%，P = 0.04）。此外，我们注意到发生的自切中有三分之二是在术后第4周前进行的，并且塔巴斯科辣酱并没有减少这种行为。我们介绍了我们的经验以及关于自切和SFI的文献综述。
