• Segolene Lithfous, Olivier Després, Thierry Pebayle, Claudia Casadio, and Andre Dufour.
• Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives et Adaptatives, UMR 7364 CNRS-UNISTRA, Strasbourg, France.
• Pain Med. 2020 Dec 25; 21 (12): 3428-3436.

ObjectiveThis study used high-speed cooling of the skin and exact control of stimulus duration to measure the cold detection threshold in healthy participants. The objective was to compare the method of limits, in which the temperature is slowly and gradually increased/decreased until the subject perceives the stimulation, and the method of levels, in which the subject must detect brief thermal stimulations close to the threshold of perception.MethodsTwenty healthy volunteers (nine women, 11 men) aged 20-30 years participated in the study. The method of limits and method of levels were performed in all subjects in a counterbalanced order. Four cold detection thresholds were measured with the method of levels, with a temperature ramp of 300°C/sec and stimulus durations of 50 ms, 100 ms, 300 ms, and 500 ms. Three thresholds were measured with the method of limits, with temperature ramps of 1°C/sec, 2°C/sec, and 4°C/sec.ResultsOn average, the cold detection thresholds were -0.47°C below skin temperature with the method of levels and -1.67°C the method of limits. Interindividual variability was significantly lower with the method of levels than with the method of limits.ConclusionsThese results suggest that the method of levels is more accurate than the method of limits for measuring cold detection threshold. The improvement of cold detection threshold measurement may provide new perspectives to more precisely assess the function of A-delta fibers and the spino-thalamic pathway.© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Academy of Pain Medicine. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

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