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A study from Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University and Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai shows that rhesus macaques repeatedly exposed to anesthesia during infancy display persistent anxiety-linked behaviors later in life in response to social stress. Epidemiological studies of human children have detected an association between multiple exposures to anesthesia and learning problems.
Research in other animal models, such as rodents, has shown anesthesia exposure early in life can lead to cell death in the brain and cognitive impairments. The research team sought to determine whether non-surgical exposure to sevoflurane, an inhaled anesthetic commonly used with children, could lead to cognitive and behavioral alterations in a nonhuman primate (NHP) model.
Researchers exposed rhesus macaques three times during the first six weeks of life to sevoflurane for four hours each time. Animals’ behavioral responses to a mild stress were recorded at one and two years of age. In these situations, animals exposed to anesthesia displayed increased behaviors such as scratching, self-touching and self-grooming, which could be interpreted as fidgeting.
There is no evidence that the exposed animals are treated differently in a normal social setting, but express increased displacement behavior under an acute stressor. In humans, displacement behaviors are a coping strategy for anxiety.
Epidemiological studies find increased incidence of learning disabilities and ADHD in kids with more than one exposure before the age of 3-4 years. The monkey studies are consistent with these reports and provide an opportunity to understand the mechanisms of anesthesia-induced cognitive changes, as well the effects in humans may be partial due to anesthesia rather than surgery.
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