A Spatial Memory Deficit in Male But Not Female Rats After Neonatal Diazepam Exposure: A New Model for Developmental Sedative Neurotoxicity

( Anesth Analg. 2024 Apr 1;138(4):856–865. doi: 10.1213/ANE.0000000000006583) Current models show that drugs targeting GABA receptors can be very damaging to neurodevelopment, though results are conflicting in human studies as opposed to animal studies. A robust time period of research in animal models has suggested; however, that some differences in cognition caused by anesthetic drugs can be difficult to detect in a clinically significant way, though their presence is a distinct possibility. Previous studies by these authors have investigated the sex-dependent differences in neurodevelopment and thus in response to neurodevelopmental toxicity and have found that both sex and timing of drug administration have significant impacts on neurodevelopmental deficits in later life. Limitations of previous studies include the specificity of the drugs used and variable mechanisms at work in addition to acting as a GABA agonist. This study aims to address these limitations by assessing a similar model of neurodevelopmental toxicity using a benzodiazepine medication, diazepam, which specifically targets GABA receptors. The primary outcome was the effect of diazepam on postnatal day 7 rats on sex-dependent spatial memory deficit.