Turkish Neurosurgery 1990 , Vol 1 , Num 3
THE EFFECTS OF SELENIUM AND ALPHA-TOCOPHEROL ON THE FREE RADICALS IN AN EXPERIMENTAL MODEL OF ACUTE SPINAL CORD INJURY
Nail İZGİ1, Mustafa BOZBOĞA1, M. Kemal HAMAMCIOĞLU1, Murat DÖŞOĞLU1, Talat KIRIŞ1, Ali CANBOLAT1, Tuncay ALTUĞ2
1Department of Neurosurgery İstanbul Medical School University of İstanbul İstanbul Turkey
2Experimental Medical Research and Application Center University of İstanbul İstanbul Turkey
Ischemia-induced lipid peroxidation is one of the most important factors producing tissue damage in spinal cord injury. In this study a standard spinal cord injury model in rats was used and the effects of chronic administration of Selenium (3 ppm/lt water orally) before and alpha-tocopherol management (100 mg/kg. intraperitoneally) just after the trauma were investigated. For this purpose animals were divided into three groups:

A (untreated controls). B (selenium-treated). C (alpha-tocopherol-treated). In group-A lipid peroxide levels increased significantly one hour after the trauma. and then decreased. In group-B. this increase was not seen (P<0.05). This study has demonstrated that chronic selenium administration is effective in preventing lipid peroxide formation in spinal cord injury. For grup-C further investigations have been planned. Keywords : Alpha-tocopherol. free radicals. posttraumatic ischemia. selenium. spinal cord injury