Sleep disruption accompanies
sleep apnea as one of its major symptoms.
Obstructive sleep apnea is particularly common in patients with
refractory epilepsy, but causing factors underlying this are far from being resolved. Therefore, translational studies regarding this issue are important. Our aim was to investigate the effects of sleep disruption on seizure susceptibility of rats using experimental model of
lindane-induced refractory
seizures. Sleep disruption in male Wistar rats with implanted EEG
electrodes was achieved by treadmill method (belt speed set on 0.02 m/s for working and 0.00 m/s for stop mode, respectively). Animals were assigned to experimental conditions lasting 6h: 1) sleep disruption (sleep interrupted, SI; 30s working and 90 s stop mode every 2 min; 180 cycles in total); 2) activity control (AC, 10 min working and 30 min stop mode, 9 cycles in total); 3) treadmill chamber control (TC, only stop mode). Afterwards, the animals were intraperitoneally treated with
lindane (L, 4 mg/kg, SI+L, AC+L and TC+L groups) or
dimethylsulfoxide (
DMSO, SIc, ACc and TCc groups). Convulsive behavior was assessed by seizure incidence, latency time to first seizure, and its severity during 30 min after
drug administration. Number and duration of ictal periods were determined in recorded EEGs. Incidence and severity of
lindane-induced
seizures were significantly increased, latency time significantly decreased in animals undergoing sleep disruption (SI+L group) compared with the animals from TC+L. Seizure latency was also significantly decreased in SI+L compared to AC+L groups. Number of ictal periods were increased and duration of it presented tendency to increase in SI+L comparing to AC+L. No convulsive signs were observed in TCc, ACc and SIc groups, as well as no ictal periods in EEG. These results indicate sleep disruption facilitates induction of epileptic activity in rodent model of
lindane-
epilepsy enabling translational research of this phenomenon.