The Clinical journal of pain
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Multicenter Study
Ethnicity, Cortisol, and Experimental Pain Responses among Persons with Symptomatic Knee Osteoarthritis.
Although several factors are known to contribute to ethnic differences in pain, relatively little attention has been devoted to physiological factors. Our first aim was to examine the relationship between cortisol and pain responses during a cold-pressor task (CPT) among African American (AA) and non-Hispanic White (NHW) adults with knee osteoarthritis (OA). Our second aim was to assess the relationship between perceived racial discrimination and cortisol among AA participants. ⋯ Consistent with previous findings in young healthy adults, cold-pressor pain responses are related to pre-CPT cortisol concentrations in NHW persons with knee OA but not in their AA counterparts. Additional studies are required to better understand this finding.