VISUAL EVOKED-POTENTIALS IN A RABBIT MODEL OF HEPATIC-ENCEPHALOPATHY .1. SEQUENTIAL-CHANGES AND COMPARISONS WITH DRUG-INDUCED COMAS

  • 1 January 1984
    • journal article
    • research article
    • Vol. 86  (3) , 540-545
Abstract
The recording of visual evoked potentials [VEP] in rabbits has been shown to be an objective, reproducible, noninvasive technique for quantitating changes in the pattern of cerebral neuronal activity. The development of hepatic encephalopathy due to galactosamine-induced fulminant hepatic failure was consistently associated with a series of distinctive changes in the VEP waveform. The pattern of the VEP in hepatic coma (due to galactosamine-induced fulminant hepatic failure) differed fundamentally from that in either-induced coma, but was identical to that in comas induced by 3 drugs which activate GABAergic neural mechanisms: pentobarbital, diazepam and muscimol. These findings are compatible with activation of the .gamma.-GABA inhibitory neurotransmitter system contributing to cerebral neuronal inhibition in hepatic coma due to galactosamine-induced fulminant hepatic failure.