HIGHLAND HEIGHTS, Ky. — Some opioid treatments could cause problems for an unborn baby, according to early new research happening at Northern Kentucky University. And it's personal for most of those involved.
The research, led by assistant professor Brittany Smith, is being done using pregnant mice and a touch screen game.
"'Is it the opioid that's causing the cognitive deficits in the offspring?' [That's] the first aim of the grant," she said. "Then the second aim of the grant is to look at changes in the brain from the opioid."
Senior Brandon Brooks-Patton got involved in the research after seeing a posting for the work. He's been analyzing the results of opioid use on the mice bodies and brains.
"I looked at the genes in a way that kind of looked for patterns," he said.
Brooks-Patton felt an immediate need to be part of the research because of the job he left just weeks ago. He'd spent a year as a firefighter paramedic in Ludlow.
"One of the things that was important to me is that, obviously as a first responder, you get to have an impact on an individual basis," Brooks-Patton said. "But this gives you an opportunity to cast a wider net because sometimes you leave somebody at the hospital and you think, 'what's next?'"
The mice in the research are observed in either what researchers call a puzzle box, in which the mice have to get to and through a door. Or researchers test the cognitive abilities using a five screen apparatus which the mice have to touch when prompted.
The early results show some of what you'd expect, and some outcomes clinicians will be watching as they formulate what treatment options are available for pregnant opioid users. Opioid use by pregnant mothers does have a cognitive impact on their babies, even without other extraneous factors, Smith is finding.
She also noted that her researchers are testing the effects of some opioid treatments on babies. Smith said they've found morphine causes deficits in babies. They are not seeing those deficits — or neuroinflammation in the brain when the mother uses bupronorphine while pregnant.
"It's all about considering like the risk versus benefit of something," Smith said.
They're able to translate their findings in the mice to similar effects in humans.
"So far we do find that the opioid is causing cognitive deficits in the offspring," she said. "So primarily we do see inattentive behavior so that could relate to higher rates of ADHD diagnosis."
Smith said she started looking into this area of research as the opioid epidemic hit a peak years ago. For Brooks-Patton, it's the natural next step in a career that's seen the effects of opioid use firsthand.
"How awesome is it to be able to see both sides of everything?" he said.
