The Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) has awarded a research grant to the Department of Anesthesia, Critical Care, Pain, and Palliative Medicine for a groundbreaking study aimed at improving care for patients with severe brain injuries. The study, led by Dr. Rayees Najib, Assistant Professor, under the mentorship of Professor Hina Bashir, Head of the Department, will utilize transcranial Doppler-based autoregulation indices to guide individualized cerebral perfusion pressure management.
The project seeks to combine advanced brain monitoring with biomarkers that indicate cellular damage, enabling clinicians to determine the precise blood flow each patient’s brain requires for optimal recovery. If successful, this research could transform critical care practices across India’s intensive care units (ICUs), where head injuries remain one of the leading causes of death and disability, particularly following road accidents.
The ICMR’s decision to fund this project marks a significant boost for advanced medical research emerging from Kashmir, a region where healthcare development has often been hindered by infrastructural limitations. This is GMC Srinagar’s first major national research funding in neurocritical care, positioning it within India’s expanding academic medicine network.
Professor Hina Bashir noted that the department’s collaboration with the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare underscores the urgency of improving critical care standards in peripheral regions. The study aims to bridge the gap between advanced research and clinical application, recognizing that traumatic brain injury is not only a hospital issue but also a major public health concern.
The project pioneers the use of individualized cerebral perfusion management in patients with traumatic brain injury by integrating advanced neuromonitoring techniques and brain injury biomarkers. The ICMR recognition reflects GMC Srinagar’s growing contribution to cutting-edge neurocritical care research and represents a milestone in the institution’s pursuit of academic and clinical excellence.
Traumatic brain injuries (TBIs) cause an estimated 150,000 deaths in India each year and leave many survivors with long-term disabilities. Most public hospitals still rely on generalized treatment protocols, with limited use of real-time, patient-specific monitoring. Road traffic accidents account for nearly 60% of TBIs, disproportionately affecting young men. The lack of pre-hospital care and limited trauma infrastructure contribute to India’s high mortality rate, with up to 95% of trauma victims not receiving optimal care within the “golden hour.”
The GMC Srinagar study will employ Doppler ultrasound technology to continuously monitor blood flow in the brain’s major arteries, allowing clinicians to adjust blood pressure targets based on each patient’s individual autoregulatory response. Such personalized care remains uncommon in Indian hospitals.
Experts believe the findings could help establish national guidelines for precision-based neurocritical care, reducing complications such as secondary brain swelling and oxygen deprivation. The research team also plans to correlate these neurological observations with biochemical markers in the blood, creating an integrated clinical model that merges physiological and molecular data for more tailored treatment approaches.
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