Diazepam Attenuates Long-Term Behavioral Incapacitation in Rhesus Monkeys Exposedto Nerve Agents

摘要

An effective treatment for nerve agent exposure consists of pyridostigminepretreatment and atropine, pralidoxime-chloride (2-PAM) and diazepam treatment. In this study, the Serial Probe Recognition Task (SPR) was used to assess the efficacy of diazepam in ameliorating the cognitive impairments that occur when only pyridostigmine pretreatment and atropine, 2-PAM treatment are used for nerve agent exposure. Fifteen rhesus monkeys were trained to correctly respond at an 80% level on a six-item SPR task. Upon completion of training, the monkeys were divided into three treatment groups. All monkeys were pretreated with pyridostigmine (0.7 mg/kg/24h), exposed to soman (0.038 mg/kg), and treated with atropine (0.2 mg/kg) and 2-PAM (25.7 mg/kg). In addition, one group of monkeys received a high dose of diazepam (0.214 mg/kg), another group received a low dose of diazepam (0.107 mg/kg) and the third group did not receive diazepam. The monkeys which received no diazepam treatment took on average 21.0 days to return to pre-exposure performance levels compared to 13.2 and 6.2 days for the monkeys which received the low and high dose of diazepam, respectively. The diazepam-treated monkeys had a significantly lower incidence of convulsions and performed significantly better on the SPR task.