Vitamin B₂ shows promise as a treatment for traumatic brain injury

Hoane MR et al. (2005) Administration of riboflavin improves behavioral outcome and reduces edema formation and glial fibrillary acidic protein expression after traumatic brain injury. J Neurotrauma 22: 1112–1122

Vitamin B₂ (riboflavin) is a potential treatment for traumatic brain injury (TBI), according to the Restorative Neuroscience Laboratory from Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, USA.

Hoane and colleagues compared the effects of B₂ and saline administration in 41 rats that had undergone cortical contusion injury (CCI)—an experimental model of TBI—or sham surgery. Animals were tested on aspects of behavioral ability such as sensorimotor performance (measured with the bilateral tactile removal test) and acquisition of reference and working memory (measured with the Morris water maze). The researchers also investigated whether B₂ administration affected lesion volume, edema formation and levels of glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) expression after CCI.

Compared with saline, B₂ administration significantly reduced the deleterious effects of CCI on sensorimotor performance (P <0.001), and also produced marked improvements in the acquisition of reference and working memory. Immunohistochemical analysis of GFAP expression around the CCI lesion sites revealed significantly lower numbers of GFAP⁺ astrocytes after B₂ administration (P <0.001). Edema formation and lesion size were also significantly reduced after B₂ administration (P <0.001 and P <0.03, respectively).

Previous studies from this laboratory indicated that vitamin B₃ holds promise as a therapy for TBI. On the basis of these new findings, the authors propose that vitamin B₂ also merits further examination as a potential treatment for patients with TBI.