European journal of pain : EJP
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Randomized Controlled Trial Comparative Study
Effect of local wound infiltration with ketamine versus dexmedetomidine on postoperative pain and stress after abdominal hysterectomy, a randomized trial.
Postoperative pain and stress elicit hormonal changes. We aimed at comparing the effects of wound infiltration with ketamine versus dexmedetomidine on postoperative pain and stress response. ⋯ Local wound infiltration with ketamine or dexmedetomidine added to bupivacaine had an opioid-sparing effect, delayed first request of rescue analgesia, and attenuated postoperative stress response, especially with ketamine in patients underwent total abdominal hysterectomy.
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Observational Study
Pain-relieving effectiveness, quality of life and tolerability of repeated capsaicin 8% patch treatment of peripheral neuropathic pain in Scandinavian clinical practice.
Clinical trials have demonstrated the efficacy and safety of the capsaicin 8% patch in patients with peripheral neuropathic pain (PNP); however, few studies have assessed this treatment in a clinical practice. ⋯ In Scandinavian clinical practice, capsaicin 8% patch treatment was associated with significant reductions in pain intensity and was well tolerated with over half of patients willing to undergo re-treatment.
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Dopamine (DA) is thought to be important to local hippocampal networks integrity during spatial working memory (sWM) processing. Chronic pain may contribute to deficient dopaminergic signalling, which may in turn affect cognition. However, the neural mechanisms that determine this impairment are poorly understood. Here, we evaluated whether the sWM impairment characteristic of animal models of chronic pain is dependent on DA D2 receptor (D2r) activity. ⋯ This study provides new insights into the role of D2r in the manifestation of pain-related sWM deficits. Our findings support that selective blockade of D2r produces a significant decrease in intrahippocampal connectivity mediated by theta-oscillations, and amplifies pain-related sWM deficits. These results suggest that further characterization of intrahippocampal dopaminergic modulation may be clinically relevant for the understanding of cognitive impairments that accompanies nociceptive stressful conditions.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Predicting drug efficacy in chronic low back pain by quantitative sensory tests.
Drugs are prescribed for chronic low back pain without knowing in advance whether a patient will respond to them or not. Quantitative sensory tests (QST) can discriminate patients according to sensory phenotype, possibly reflecting underlying mechanisms of pain processing. QST may therefore be a screening tool to identify potential responders to a certain drug. The aim of this study was to investigate whether QST can predict analgesic effects of oxycodone, imipramine and clobazam in chronic low back pain. ⋯ Predicting drug efficacy in chronic low back pain remains difficult. There is some evidence that patients more sensitive to heat and cold pain respond better to imipramine.
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Pain in response to noxious cold has a complex molecular background probably involving several types of sensors. A recent observation has been the multimodal distribution of human cold pain thresholds. This study aimed at analysing reproducibility and stability of this observation and further exploration of data patterns supporting a complex background. ⋯ Sensitivity to pain is heterogeneous. Data-driven computational research approaches allow the identification of subgroups of subjects with a distinct pattern of sensitivity to cold stimuli. The subgroups are reproducible with different types of noxious cold stimuli. Subgroups show pattern that hints at distinct and inter-individually different types of the underlying molecular background.