Effect of electroacupuncture at acupoints of the governor vessel on aquaporin-4 in rat with experimental spinal cord injury.

This study is to investigate the effects of electroacupuncture at acupoints of the Governor Vessel (GV) on aquaporin-4 (AQP-4) expression and on functions of the hind limbs in the rat of spinal cord injury. The functions of the hind limbs were detected with BBB scale on the 1d, 3d, 7 d and 21 d after the spinal cord injury, respectively, and AQP-4 expression in the spinal cord was determined with immunohistochemical method and analyzed quantitatively with image analyzer. The results indicated that on the 1 d after the spinal cord injury, increased AQP-4 expression can be seen significantly in both the gray matter and the white matter of the injured spinal cord, and it reached the peaks on the 3d after the spinal cord injury in both the electroacupuncture group and the spinal cord injury group. However, AQP-4 express was significantly decreased in the electroacupuncture group as compared with that in the control group on 7 d, 14 d and 21 d (P < 0.05 or P < 0.01). The decrease of AQP-4 expression almost went with the improvement of the neurological function, which suggested that electroacupuncture at the acupoints of the Governor Vessel can inhibit edema of the spinal cord to alleviate the secondary spinal cord injury by means of decreasing the AQP-4 expression after the spinal cord injury, so as to protect the residual normal spinal cord tissues and promote the rebuilding of nervous tissues.