Comparison of sympathetic skin response and digital infrared thermographic imaging in peripheral neuropathy

Abstract

It is well known that the SSR (sympathetic skin response) is to evaluate the function of sudomotor activity and Digital infrared thermal imaging (DITI) is to evaluate the function of vasomotor activity of the sympathetic nerve. To assess the sympathetic nerve impairment in the patients with peripheral neuropathy, the SSRs and DITIs were tested in 35 cases. Twenty-four (68.6%) patients were abnormal on SSR test and twenty-nine (82.9%) patients were abnormal on DITI test. In the relationship between DITI and SSR, 19 (54.3%) cases were abnormal and 1 case was normal finding in both of these two tests. And the remaining 25 (42.9%) patients were abnormal on only either one of both tests. Frequency of abnormal SSR and DITI findings were correlated with severity of axonal involvement in peripheral nerve lesion. The results of this study revealed DITI to be more sensitive test in assessing sympathetic dysfunction in peripheral neuropathy than the SSR. However DITI has very limited values in the patients with symmetrically involved peripheral neuropathy because thermal asymmetry is considered as abnormal on DITI. Therefore, in assessing the function of sympathetic nerve in peripheral neuropathy, combined tests of SSR and DITI are useful.

Early assessment of the efficacy of digital infrared thermal imaging in pediatric extremity trauma

“…It has probably been most investigated for breast cancer [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13], but growing literature reports its use in a variety of other medical conditions [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. To the best of our knowledge, however, there are only two reports of the use of DITI in skeletal trauma.…”

Infrared Thermography in Pain Medicine

“…Considering that IRT visualizes physiological and functional abnormalities rather than anatomical abnormalities, there is no doubt that compared to other imaging diagnostic methods, IRT is an effective diagnostic method for diseases difficult to diagnose with CT or MRI, such as CRPS, neuropathic pain, headache, and myofascial pain. In fact, for CRPS, it is known to have higher sensitivity compared to MRI or three phase bone scan [5,19], and it is reported that thermography has higher sensitivity in diagnosis of neuropathic pain compared to the sympathetic skin response test [20]. When deciding an abnormality in specific diseases, there are different views on what the 'reference temperature difference' should be according to researcher, and for CRPS, standards such as 0.6℃ [21] and 1.0℃ [22] are used.…”

Therapeutic Massage of the Neck and Shoulders Produces Changes in Peripheral Blood Flow When Assessed with Dynamic Infrared Thermography

“…These time intervals were chosen to replicate time intervals in previous literature. [31][32][33][34] All thermal images were recorded using Computerized Thermal Imaging Processor systems (TIP, TM Computerized Thermal Imaging Inc., Ogden, UT), and analyzed using TIP Med Software (TIP Med Windows XP, Version 3.0.2). Data were placed into an Excel spreadsheet (Microsoft Office Excel 2007) and analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) software (Version 16).…”