An Exploration of the Hypocholinergic Hypothesis of Delirium following Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Jacob T. Kean, Ph.D., Principal Investigator

Traumatic brain injury (TBI) often causes delirium (confusion and sometimes agitation) in patients recovering from these types of events.  One of the neurochemical systems that stabilize the brain, the acetylcholine system, often becomes unbalanced when injuries like this occur, often worsening confusion. We suspect that some drugs that are used with these kinds of injuries create further imbalances in this system. Currently Dr. Jacob Kean is conducting a study to determine whether a specific class of drugs (anticholinergic) could be aggravating this imbalance in these patients. Should this study point to a connection between some of these drugs and the imbalance of the acetylcholine system, it could suggest better outcomes may be achieved by limiting the use of these drugs in patients with brain injuries, including reducing confusion and potentially enhancing the speed of recovery.