A Rodent Model of Traumatic Stress Induces Lasting Sleep and Quantitative Electroencephalographic Disturbances

Hyperarousal and sleep disturbances are common, debilitating symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). PTSD patients also exhibit abnormalities in quantitative electroencephalography (qEEG) power spectra during wake as well as rapid eye movement (REM) and non-REM (NREM) sleep. Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), the first-line pharmacological treatment for PTSD, provide modest remediation of the hyperarousal symptoms in PTSD patients, but have little to no effect on the sleep–wake architecture deficits. Development of novel therapeutics for these sleep–wake architecture deficits is limited by a lack of relevant animal models. Thus, the present study investigated whether single prolonged stress (SPS), a rodent model of traumatic stress, induces PTSD-like sleep–wake and qEEG spectral power abnormalities that correlate with changes in central serotonin (5-HT) and neuropeptide Y (NPY) signaling in rats. Rats were implanted with telemetric recording devices to continuously measure EEG bef...