Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) is a devastating condition that affects people suddenly and without warning. Although many patients recover, a significant number of patients are left suffering from cognitive deficits (e.g. impairments in tasks of short-term and long-term memory, verbal fluency, orientation, unilateral sensory neglect, visual field defects, anosognosia, constructional apraxia and motor impersistence). However, the neurochemical substrates underlying cognitive deficits following ICH are not well understood. It has been suggested that alterations in cholinergic neurotransmission may contribute to the cognitive deficits following ICH. Cholinergic neurons are enriched in the basal forebrain and send widespread projections to brain regions involved with learning, memory and cognitive processing. The impact of ICH on acetylcholine production and transmission is not known. This research seeks to answer whether ICH in the region of the ventral pallidum/basal forebrain results in a significant decrease in cholinergic cells and transmission.
