Conditions: Traumatic Brain Injury
Keywords: Trauma Brain Injury
Allocation: RANDOMIZED | Intervention model: PARALLEL
Enrollment: 882
Healthy volunteers: no

Brief summary:
The ProTECT study will determine if intravenous (IV) progesterone (started within 4 hours of injury and given for a total of 96 hours), is more effective than placebo for treating victims of moderate to severe acute traumatic brain injury.

Detailed description:

Arms:
arm 1: Following a one hour loading dose of 0.714 mg/kg per infusion pump through a dedicated IV line, the study drug (progesterone) will be administered as a continuous intravenous infusion at 0.5 mg/kg/hr for 71 hours, then tapered over an additional 24 hours. To simplify the infusion protocol, a weight based dosing table will be used by the on-sight pharmacy to mix the correct dose for a 10 cc/hour continuous infusion over the 72 hour steady state period followed by three additional 8-hour decrements (7.5 cc/hr-5.0 cc/hr-2.5 cc/hr) to zero, for a total treatment duration of 96 hour. The progesterone will be combined with a 20% Intralipid mixture for infusion. arm 2: Placebo stock solution was the ethanol diluent required for dissolving progesterone. The volume of placebo to be mixed with intralipid was based on the same mg/kg/hr volume that would be required if PROG had been in the vial. Using an infusion pump through a dedicated IV line - a one hour "loading dose" of placebo plus intralipid was administered as a continuous intravenous infusion for 71 hours, then tapered over an additional 24 hours. To simplify the infusion protocol, a weight based dosing table was used by the on-sight pharmacy to mix the correct "dose" for a 10 cc/hour continuous infusion over the 72 hour steady state period followed by three additional 8-hour decrements (7.5 cc/hr-5.0 cc/hr-2.5 cc/hr) to zero, for a total treatment duration of 96 hour. The placebo will be combined with a 20% Intralipid mixture for infusion.

Interventions: intervention 1: Progesterone intervention 2: Placebo
Intervention descriptions: intervention 1: Following a one hour loading dose of 0.714 mg/kg per infusion pump through a dedicated IV line, the study drug (progesterone or placebo) will be administered as a continuous intravenous infusion at 0.5 mg/kg/hr for 71 hours, then tapered over an additional 24 hours. To simplify the infusion protocol, a weight based dosing table will be used by the on-sight pharmacy to mix the correct dose for a 10 cc/hour continuous infusion over the 71 hour steady state period followed by three additional 8-hour decrements (7.5 cc/hr-5.0 cc/hr-2.5 cc/hr) to zero, for a total treatment duration of 96 hour. The progesterone/placebo will be combined with a 20% Intralipid mixture for infusion. intervention 2: Placebo stock solution is the ethanol diluent required for dissolving progesterone. The volume of placebo to be mixed with intralipid is based on the mg/kg/hr volume. Using an infusion pump through a dedicated IV line - a one hour "loading dose" of placebo plus intralipid is administered as a continuous intravenous infusion for 71 hours, then tapered over an additional 24 hours.

Protocol document: