Mechanisms and prevention of secondary brain damage during intensive care.

The injured brain may be damaged by primary impact, secondary injury from secondary damage due to initiation of destructive inflammatory and biochemical cascades by the primary injury or secondary ischemic injury following secondary insults that initiate or augment these immunological and biochemical cascades. Cerebral ischemia will arise whenever delivery of oxygen and substrates to the brain fall below metabolic needs. Many factors lead to the development of secondary insults to the injured brain during initial resuscitation, transport, surgery, and subsequent intensive care. Continuous monitoring of cerebral oxygenation (jugular oximetry, brain tissue PO2) and cerebral blood flow velocity (transcranial Doppler ultrasonography) in patients with brain trauma reveals multiple episodes of transient hypoperfusion with an adverse relationship between incidence and outcome. Secondary brain insults arise through systemic or intracranial mechanisms that reduce cerebral blood flow from compromised CPP, vascular distortion or cerebrovascular narrowing or lower oxygen delivery from hypoxemia associated with airway obstruction, pulmonary pathology, or anemia. Secondary brain ischemia remains a common pathway to secondary brain damage in most critically ill neurosurgical patients. In the future prevention of secondary brain injury may well hinge on giving a cocktail of novel agents that modify destructive biochemical and inflammatory pathways, each having a potential therapeutic window possibly in a subgroup of patients. To date, phase 3 clinical trials of several agents including PEGSOD and tyrilizad mesylate have failed to show relevant efficacy after brain trauma or subarachnoid hemorrhage. The therapeutic role of calcium channel blockers in traumatic subarachnoid hemorrhage is currently under investigation following the results of subgroup metaanalysis. Several phase 3, NMDA receptor antagonist studies are underway in brain trauma with results expected soon. Although we know that secondary insults promote excitotoxic secondary brain damage there is currently no pharmacological intervention with proven efficacy and, therefore, detection and correction of secondary insults appear to offer the best therapeutic strategy. After brain trauma, systemic hypotension, compromised CPP, raised ICP, elevated temperature, hypoxemia, and jugular bulb venous desaturation are associated with poor prognosis. Clinical trials of moderate hypothermia following brain trauma are ongoing. Following adult brain trauma maintenance of CPP above at least 65 mmHg (probably > 40 mmHg in children below 8 years) seems important to improve outcome indicating the need for continuous ICP monitoring during intensive care of brain-injured patients.