A comparative study of cortical responses evoked by transcutaneous electrical vs CO2 laser stimulation

Tommaso, Marina de; Santostasi, R.; Devitofrancesco, Vito; Franco, Giovanni; Vecchio, Eleonora; Delussi, Marianna; Livrea, Paolo; Katzarava, Z.

doi:10.1016/j.clinph.2011.05.006

Cited by 54 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 35 publications

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“…The stimulation with a CE was used, providing a noxious stimulation comparable to the laser stimulation in terms of intensity and quality (pinprick sensation) of pain without requiring a second laser device. However, in our experiment, the CE stimulation may not have been nociceptive specific due to high intensities of stimulation which are known to co-excite large myelinated A␤ fibers (de Tommaso et al 2011;Kaube et al 2000;Perchet et al 2012), unless electrical stimuli are applied with a maximal intensity of twice the perception threshold .…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Somatosensory spatial attention modulates amplitudes, latencies, and latency jitter of laser-evoked brain potentials

Franz

Nickel

Ritter

et al. 2015

Journal of Neurophysiology

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Several studies provided evidence that the amplitudes of laser-evoked potentials (LEPs) are modulated by attention. However, previous reports were based on across-trial averaging of LEP responses at the expense of losing information about intertrial variability related to attentional modulation. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of somatosensory spatial attention on single-trial parameters (i.e., amplitudes, latencies, and latency jitter) of LEP components (N2 and P2). Twelve subjects participated in a sustained spatial attention paradigm while noxious laser stimuli (left hand) and noxious electrical stimuli (right hand) were sequentially delivered to the dorsum of the respective hand with nonnoxious air puffs randomly interspersed within the sequence of noxious stimuli. Participants were instructed to mentally count all stimuli (i.e., noxious and nonnoxious) applied to the attended location. Laser stimuli, presented to the attended hand (ALS), elicited larger single-trial amplitudes of the N2 component compared with unattended laser stimuli (ULS). In contrast, single-trial amplitudes of the P2 component were not significantly affected by spatial attention. Single-trial latencies of the N2 and P2 were significantly smaller for ALS vs. ULS. Additionally, the across-trial latency jitter of the N2 component was reduced for ALS. Conversely, the latency jitter of the P2 component was smaller for ULS compared with ALS. With the use of single-trial analysis, the study provided new insights into brain dynamics of LEPs related to spatial attention. Our results indicate that single-trial parameters of LEP components are differentially modulated by spatial attention.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Somatosensory spatial attention modulates amplitudes, latencies, and latency jitter of laser-evoked brain potentials

Franz

Nickel

Ritter

et al. 2015

Journal of Neurophysiology

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“…However, systematic studies suggest that concentric electrodes also activate non-nociceptive Aβ fibres. 25,26 In at least one clinical study, PREPs failed to detect nociceptive pathway lesions that were readily identified by LEPs in patients with Wallenberg syndrome and syringomyelia. 25 In its present state, therefore, measurement of PREPs is not suitable for clinical assessment of nociceptive pathways.…”

Section: Laboratory Toolsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Reappraising neuropathic pain in humans—how symptoms help disclose mechanisms

2013

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Neuropathic pain--that is, pain arising directly from a lesion or disease that affects the somatosensory system--is a common clinical problem, and typically causes patients intense distress. Patients with neuropathic pain have sensory abnormalities on clinical examination and experience pain of diverse types, some spontaneous and others provoked. Spontaneous pain typically manifests as ongoing burning pain or paroxysmal electric shock-like sensations. Provoked pain includes pain induced by various stimuli or even gentle brushing (dynamic mechanical allodynia). Recent clinical and neurophysiological studies suggest that the various pain types arise through distinct pathophysiological mechanisms. Ongoing burning pain primarily reflects spontaneous hyperactivity in nociceptive-fibre pathways, originating from 'irritable' nociceptors, regenerating nerve sprouts or denervated central neurons. Paroxysmal sensations can be caused by several mechanisms; for example, electric shock-like sensations probably arise from high-frequency bursts generated in demyelinated non-nociceptive Aβ fibres. Most human and animal findings suggest that brush-evoked allodynia originates from Aβ fibres projecting onto previously sensitized nociceptive neurons in the dorsal horn, with additional contributions from plastic changes in the brainstem and thalamus. Here, we propose that the emerging mechanism-based approach to the study of neuropathic pain might aid the tailoring of therapy to the individual patient, and could be useful for drug development.

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“…It can therefore depolarize the superficial layer of the dermis containing nociceptive A-delta fibers (Kaube, Katsarava, Kaufer, Diener, & Ellrich, 2000); however, A-beta fibers also might be concomitantly stimulated (de Tommaso et al, 2011). Pinprick-like painful sensation is generally produced at currents between 0.6 and 1.6 mA.…”

Section: Stimulimentioning

confidence: 99%

tDCS Modulation of Visually Induced Analgesia

Mancini

Bolognini

Haggard

et al. 2012

Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

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Multisensory interactions can produce analgesic effects. In particular, viewing one's own body reduces pain levels, perhaps because of changes in connectivity between visual areas specialized for body representation, and sensory areas underlying pain perception. We tested the causal role of the extrastriate visual cortex in triggering visually induced analgesia by modulating the excitability of this region with transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). Anodal, cathodal, or sham tDCS (2 mA, 10 min) was administered to 24 healthy participants over the right occipital or over the centro-parietal areas thought to be involved in the sensory processing of pain. Participants were required to rate the intensity of painful electrical stimuli while viewing either their left hand or an object occluding the left hand, both before and immediately after tDCS. We found that the analgesic effect of viewing the body was enhanced selectively by anodal stimulation of the occipital cortex. The effect was specific for the polarity and the site of stimulation. The present results indicate that visually induced analgesia may depend on neural signals from the extrastriate visual cortex.

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A comparative study of cortical responses evoked by transcutaneous electrical vs CO2 laser stimulation

Cited by 54 publications

References 35 publications

Somatosensory spatial attention modulates amplitudes, latencies, and latency jitter of laser-evoked brain potentials

Somatosensory spatial attention modulates amplitudes, latencies, and latency jitter of laser-evoked brain potentials

Reappraising neuropathic pain in humans—how symptoms help disclose mechanisms

tDCS Modulation of Visually Induced Analgesia

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