Pain medicine : the official journal of the American Academy of Pain Medicine
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To examine the impact of educational materials for chronic overlapping pain conditions (COPCs), the feasibility of delivering materials online, and to explore its impact on self-reported self-management applications at 3-month follow-up. ⋯ The educational materials facilitated teaching of key pain concepts in self-management programs, which translated easily into an electronic format. Education alone may not elicit self-management engagement or symptom reduction in this population; however, conclusions are limited by the study's uncontrolled design. Education is likely an important and meaningful first step in comprehensive COPC self-management.
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This study aimed to capture day-to-day changes in pain intensity in individuals with low back pain (LBP), which may be indicative of patients' ability to modulate their pain levels. A secondary aim was to explore the presence of latent subgroups characterized by pain level, intraindividual pain variability, and change in pain over a 14-day period. ⋯ These findings provide support that day-to-day changes in pain, coping, and affective responses are meaningful and provide additional evidence of pain variability as a potential phenotypic characteristic.
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Myofascial trigger point diagnosis is a clinical palpatory skill dependent on the patient's subjective response. The inter- and intra-rater reliability of trigger point physical evaluation in the lower leg muscles has rarely been reported. Previous reliability studies suffered from the Kappa paradox. ⋯ Physical examination is a reliable method of trigger point evaluation in lower leg muscles, and it can be used as a diagnostic method for trigger point evaluation.
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Since the pioneering reports of the so-called leonine face in cluster headache (CH) patients, cranial and facial features of these patients have been poorly investigated with conflicting results. We aimed to investigate whether abnormalities in craniometric measurements could characterize male CH patients and represent reliable and reproducible diagnostic biomarkers able to identify CH patients. ⋯ The craniometric evaluation by means of brain 3D computed tomography could represent a widespread, noninvasive, and accurate tool to support CH diagnosis to avoid frequent misdiagnosis or delay in the diagnostic process.
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In addition to pain, people with complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) often report inattention to and disengagement from their affected limb (i.e., "neglect-like symptoms"). Understanding how these symptoms relate to other characteristics of CRPS, and chronic pain generally, could provide insights for preventing and treating CRPS. ⋯ This study confirms the specificity of inattention to and disengagement from the affected limb in CRPS, independent of other factors. Furthermore, two components of the Neurobehavioral questionnaire were disentangled: motor and cognitive neglect-like symptoms, and involuntary movements. Results could potentially help clinicians to better assess neglect-like symptoms in chronic pain .