Enriched environment protects the retina from diabetic damage in adult rats

DORFMAN D; ARANDA ML; GONZÁLEZ FLEITAS MF; CHIANELLI MS; FERNANDEZ DC; ROSENSTEIN RE

Orlando

Congreso; ARVO Annual Meeting 2014; 2014

Purpose: Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is a leading cause of acquired blindness. Available treatments are not very effective. Enriched environment (EE) constitutes a strategy that boosts exploratory, visual, and cognitive activities as well as social interaction and voluntary physical exercise. We investigated the effect of EE housing on retinal damage induced by experimental diabetes.Methods: Diabetes was induced by an intraperitoneal injection of streptozotocin (STZ) 60mg/Kg. EE consisted of big cages housing 6 animals and containing several food hoppers, wheels and different objects repositioned once/day and fully substituted once/week. DR was evaluated in terms of: i) retinal function (electroretinogram (ERG) and oscillatory potentials (OPs)), ii) integrity of blood- retinal barrier (by albumin-Evan´s Blue complex leakage and astrocyte glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) immunohistochemistry), and iii) vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) levels (by Western blot and immunohistochemistry).Results: EE significantly preserved ERG a- and b-wave and OPs, avoided albumin-Evan´s blue leakage, and prevented the decrease in astrocyte GFAP levels in diabetic rats. EE prevented the increase in VEGF levels induced by experimental diabetes. When EE housing started 7 weeks after diabetes onset, retinal function was significantly preserved.Conclusions: These results indicate that EE housing could become a novel and harmless therapeutic strategie in DR treatment.