Neuroscience letters
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Neuroscience letters · Mar 1998
Amount of sympathetic sprouting in the dorsal root ganglia is not correlated to the level of sympathetic dependence of neuropathic pain in a rat model.
Incomplete peripheral nerve injury often leads to neuropathic pains, some of which are relieved by sympathectomy, and results in sympathetic postganglionic nerve fiber sprouting in the dorsal root ganglion (DRG). This study was performed to see whether the sprouting in the DRG plays a key role in the sympathetic dependence of neuropathic pain. ⋯ Immuno-histochemical staining with tyrosine hydroxylase antibody of the S1-S3 DRGs was not correlated with the sensitivity to phentolamine. These results suggest that the degree of sympathetic dependence of neuropathic pain is not a function of the extent of the sympathetic postganglionic nerve fiber sprouting in the DRG.