Remote Ischemic Conditioning as a Treatment for Traumatic Brain Injury

The autoRIC device from CellAegis technologies will be applied as per the manufacturer's instructions on an upper extremity. The device will automatically inflate and deflate a blood pressure cuff to supra-systolic blood pressures, maintaining an occlusive pressure for a period of five minutes, followed by five minutes of re-perfusion with cuff deflation, completing a ten minute cycle. This cycle will repeat four times for a cumulative total of twenty minutes of occlusive conditioning over forty minutes of intervention time.

Standard treatment of TBI in a dedicated trauma-neuro intensive care unit will include a tiered management strategy corresponding to many published treatment algorithms, including the American College of Surgeons Trauma Quality Improvement Program (ACS TQIP) guidelines for the management of intra-cranial hypertension. Standard practice without limitations will be applied to both cohorts of patients in this study.