ABSTRACT
Biomarkers have a vast and promising potential to impact the treatment of various traumatic brain injury-related complications and the subsequent recovery of TBI patients both acutely and in the long-term. These biomarkers, obtained from the cerebrospinal fl uid (CSF) and blood serum, will provide clinicians with more tools to treat patients. Physicians, nurses and other members of the healthcare team will be able to utilize biomarkers to: 1) predict which therapies will be effective on a patient-by-patient basis; and 2) monitor the effectiveness of these said therapies (Manne et al., 2005). Researchers are working to identify molecular targets for novel and existing therapies; however, therapeutic research for brain injury presents unique challenges compared to therapeutic research for other diseases. Unlike a
1 Department of Biomedical Sciences, College of Medicine, 1115 W. Call Street, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306-4300.
