Pain physician
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Fibromyalgia (FM) is a chronic disease, with no effective treatments for this disorder. The origin is suspected to be a misprocessing of signals in the central nervous system. One of the experimental treatments is very low intensity transcranial magnetic stimulation (LITMS) used to perform central neuromodulation. ⋯ This treatment improves the patients' symptomatology, and also produces statistical changes in alpha brain activity in the DLPFS. Furthermore, a normalization was observed in this frequency and in this area, similar to that of the controls.
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Numerous animal models of intervertebral disc (IVD) degeneration have been proposed in the literature. The rat caudal disc has been used in disc degeneration studies because of its low cost and simplicity. However, no consensus on the size of the needle to be used during this process has been reached, yet. ⋯ We conclude that the size of the needle affects the onset and the progression of disc degeneration; a larger needle size leads to a more extended histological and radiographic degeneration within the IVD and in a relatively short time. Therefore, a 21G needle is an optimal choice to induce rapid degeneration in rats' caudal discs. However, the use of a 29G needle failed to establish a degenerative IVD model, which makes it ideal for IVD injection of drugs, plasmids, and growth factors. A 25G needle may be used to induce gradual degeneration.