Cerebral blood flow of rats with water-intoxicated brain edema

Water intoxication brain edema was produced in rats by intraperitoneal loading of excessive amounts of distilled water (DW). In 10% and 20% groups, DW in amounts of 10 or 20% of body weight was injected, respectively. Water content of brain tissue increased proportionally to the amount of injected water, as follows: 79.8% of wet weight in control, 80.5 and 82.4 in 10% and 20% DW groups, respectively. Since cerebral blood flow (CBF) values measured by laser Doppler (LD) flowmetry were found to give a good correlation with those by hydrogen clearance method in a preliminary experiment, CBF measurement were carried out using LD flowmetry thereafter. Before the injection, CBF values were around 50 ml/min/100 g. Two hours after the water loading, CBF values in 10% and 20% DW groups were 25.6 and 20.3 ml/100 g/min, respectively. CBF values under these edematous condition decreased significantly (p < 0.001 by paired t-test) in proportion to the severity of the brain edema.