European journal of pain : EJP
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Depression and suicidal ideation are important health problems in athletes suffering from pain. Dysfunctional pain cognitions, that is, pain-related thought suppression (PTS), may play an important role in their aetiology. Thought suppression was shown to increase depressive mood, particularly in highly stressed individuals. This cross-sectional study examines the relationship between PTS and stress on depression and suicidal ideation in athletes with pain. ⋯ This study contributes to the understanding of depression in athletes with pain, suggesting stress and pain-related thought suppression to increase symptoms and prevalence of depression. As athletes often experience acute or chronic pain, understanding the impact of pain cognitions on health outcomes is an important step in the optimization of treatments.
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Complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) is much more prevalent in women than men but potential differences in clinical phenotype have not been thoroughly explored to date. Differences in the clinical presentation between sexes may point at new avenues for a more tailored management approach of CRPS. We therefore explored if in CRPS, the patient's sex is associated with differences in clinical and psychological characteristics. ⋯ What is known? Nonsex-specific clinical data of CRPS patients. What is new? Male CRPS patients used more often extreme words to describe the affective qualities of pain, used more passive pain coping strategies, and were more likely to suffer from depression and kinesiophobia.
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Previous studies investigated cold-evoked potentials (CEPs) for the assessment of the integrity of cold-mediating A-delta fibres and the spinothalamic tract. Nevertheless, several methodological questions remained unanswered to proceed to clinical application. How do latencies and amplitudes vary between CEPs and contact heat-evoked potentials (CHEPs)? Are there differences between variable and fixed thermode positions or between glabrous and hairy skin? Are CEPs recordable in patients with abnormal cold processing? ⋯ Cold-evoked potentials are an innovative, non-invasive technique to assess cold detection and processing objectively. This study shows that CEP can be recorded from the hairy and glabrous skin, regardless of using fixed or variable thermode positions. Loss of A-delta fibre function leads to an increased CEP latency, consistent with loss of cold detection in the QST.
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The objective of this study was to describe, in a cohort of patients followed for bladder, bowel or sexual dysfunctions, the occurrence of radicular pain during micturition, defecation and/or orgasm. ⋯ Few data are available on sciatica during micturition, defecation or orgasm. This study underlines the need for appropriate tests if a patient complaint from this type of symptom. Indeed, the most common underlying lesion is a radiculopathy but can also be a lesion of conus medullaris.
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Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS) is a non-invasive treatment to relieve pain. Contralateral TENS (i.e. TENS administered to the contralateral side of a painful body part) is beneficial when TENS cannot be directly applied to pain site, such as in cases of trauma. Although TENS produces segmental analgesia in an ipsilateral limb, it has been unclear whether TENS produces higher analgesic effects in the contralateral segmental area. The aim of the present study was to investigate the analgesic effects of TENS in contralateral segmental or extra-segmental areas on physiological and subjective pain outcomes, using a nociceptive flexion reflex (NFR) method. ⋯ Our findings provide support for the contralateral approach at stimulation sites when TENS cannot be directly administered to a pain site (e.g. due to disease or trauma).