{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,23]],"date-time":"2026-09-23T13:51:43Z","timestamp":1790171503661,"version":"4.1.0"},"reference-count":24,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"15","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2019,8,1]],"date-time":"2019-08-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1564617600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["IJMS"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Spinal cord injury (SCI) is associated with an increased susceptibility to infections, such as pneumonia, which is the leading cause of death in these patients. This phenomenon is referred to as SCI immune deficiency syndrome (SCI-IDS), and has been shown to be more prevalent after high-level transection in preclinical SCI models. Despite the high prevalence of contusion SCIs, the effects of this etiology have not been studied in the context of SCI-IDS. Compared to transection SCIs, which involve a complete loss of supraspinal input and lead to the disinhibition of spinally-generated activity, contusion SCIs may cause significant local deafferentation, but only a partial disruption of sympathetic tone below the level of injury. In this work, we investigate the effects of thoracic (T6-7) and cervical (C6-7) moderate\u2013severe contusion SCIs on the spleen by characterizing splenic norepinephrine (NE) and cortisol (CORT), caspase-3, and multiple inflammation markers at 3- and 7-days post-SCI. In contrary to the literature, we observe an increase in splenic NE and CORT that correspond to an increase in caspase-3 after thoracic SCI relative to cervical SCI. Further, we found differences in expression of leptin, eotaxin, IP-10, and IL-18 that implicate alterations in splenocyte recruitment and function. These results suggest that incomplete SCI drastically alters the level-dependence of SCI-IDS.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/ijms20153762","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2019,8,1]],"date-time":"2019-08-01T11:39:37Z","timestamp":1564659577000},"page":"3762","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":21,"title":["Incomplete Spinal Cord Injury Reverses the Level-Dependence of Spinal Cord Injury Immune Deficiency Syndrome"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"20","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5383-8267","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"James","family":"Hong","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Institute for Medical Science, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 1A8, Canada"},{"name":"Krembil Research Institute, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, ON M5T 0S8, Canada"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Alex","family":"Chang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Krembil Research Institute, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, ON M5T 0S8, Canada"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Yang","family":"Liu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Krembil Research Institute, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, ON M5T 0S8, Canada"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8319-9518","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jian","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Krembil Research Institute, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, ON M5T 0S8, Canada"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5722-6364","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Michael G.","family":"Fehlings","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Krembil Research Institute, Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, ON M5T 0S8, Canada"},{"name":"Division of Neurosurgery, Faculty of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON M5S 1A8, Canada"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2019,8,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1194","DOI":"10.1016\/j.neuroscience.2008.08.021","article-title":"Immune depression syndrome following human spinal cord injury (SCI): A pilot study","volume":"158","author":"Riegger","year":"2009","journal-title":"Neuroscience"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"692","DOI":"10.1093\/brain\/awv375","article-title":"Spinal cord injury-induced immune deficiency syndrome enhances infection susceptibility dependent on lesion level","volume":"139","author":"Brommer","year":"2016","journal-title":"Brain"},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Kopp, M.A., Druschel, C., Meisel, C., Liebscher, T., Prilipp, E., Watzlawick, R., Cinelli, P., Niedeggen, A., Schaser, K.D., and Wanner, G.A. 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