• Benjamin Rahm, Michael Lacour, Jean Decety, Juliane Müller, Carl-Eduard Scheidt, Joachim Bauer, Ralf König, Michael Wirsching, Volkmar Glauche, Sabine Ohlendorf, Thomas Unterbrink, Armin Hartmann, and Andreas A Joos.
• Medical Psychology and Medical Sociology, Clinic and Polyclinic for Psychosomatic Medicine and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center, Mainz, Germany.
• Compr Psychiatry. 2015 May 1; 59: 80-90.

BackgroundDysfunction of central nervous pain processing is assumed to play a key role in primary fibromyalgia (FM) syndrome. This pilot study examined differences of pain processing associated with adopting different interpersonal perspectives.MethodsEleven FM patients and 11 healthy controls (HC) were scanned with functional magnetic resonance imaging. Participants were trained to take either a self-perspective or another person's perspective when viewing the visual stimuli. Stimuli showed body parts in painful situations of varying intensity (low, medium, and high) and visually similar but neutral situations.ResultsPatients with FM showed a higher increase in blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) response, particularly in the supplementary motor area (SMA). All pain-related regions of interest (anterior insula, somatosensory cortices, anterior cingulate cortex, and SMA) showed stronger modulation of BOLD responses in FM patients in the self-perspective. In contrast to pain processing regions, perspective-related regions (e.g. temporoparietal junction) did not differ between FM and HC.ConclusionsThe stronger response of all four pain processing cerebral regions during self-perspective is discussed in the light of disturbed bottom-up processing. Furthermore, the results confirm earlier reports of augmented pain processing in FM, and provide evidence for sensitization of central nervous pain processing.Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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