European journal of pain : EJP
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Seeing the site of treatment improves habitual pain but not cervical joint position sense immediately after manual therapy in chronic neck pain patients.
Visual analgesia refers to the phenomena where people report decreased pain intensity when they see the painful or painfully stimulated body part. Alongside pain, sensorimotor impairment (i.e., disturbed proprioception) is also evident in chronic pain. This study aims to investigate whether real-time visual feedback offers additional pain relief and proprioceptive improvement when used in combination with recommended therapies in neck pain patients who received manual therapy with or without real-time visual feedback. ⋯ Real-time visual feedback reduces habitual pain immediately after the intervention. Due to its easy integration, it may be an effective adjunct to recommended interventions (i.e., manual therapy) in patients with neck pain.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
The beta-adrenergic receptor agonist, terbutaline, reduces UVB-induced mechanical sensitization in humans.
Previously, we found in cultures of primary neurons and in animals that sensitized primary neurons can be desensitized by treatment with e.g. beta-adrenergic receptor agonists. We now tested whether also in human sensitization such as UVB-radiation induced sunburn-like hyperalgesia can be reduced by intradermal injection of the beta-adrenergic receptor agonist terbutaline. ⋯ We previously showed in model systems that beta-adrenergic stimulation can not only sensitize but also desensitize nociceptors. Our study shows that also in humans beta-adrenergic agonists desensitize if injected into UVB-sensitized skin. This indicates an analgesic activity of adrenergic agonists in addition to their vasoconstrictory function.