Neural correlates coding stimulus level and perception of capsaicin-evoked urge-to-cough in humans

Brain structural correlates of sensory phenomena in patients with obsessive–compulsive disorder

“…40,41 Moreover, somatosensory cortex hyperactivity and the prominent influence of somatosensory information over motor cortex activity has been consistently reported in association with the presence of SP, [11][12][13][14] and neural activity in the sensorimotor area has been related to urge sensations in other contexts, such as voluntary blink suppression, 42 urge to void, 43 or urge to cough. 44 Likewise, it should be highlighted that while in Tourette syndrome samples grey matter increases have been located in more lateral regions of the somatosensory cortex (corresponding to the face and speech related regions), 15 in our study grey matter increases were observed in more medial regions, corresponding to the trunk and appendicular body regions, where most of the bodily SP are experienced by patients with OCD.…”

A worldwide survey of chronic cough: a manifestation of enhanced somatosensory response

“…Females were more sensitive to capsaicin challenge and despite the lower stimulus the magnitude of the activation in the somatosensory cortex was approximately twice that of males. The region of the somatosensory cortex displaying the sex-related differences is known to receive airway sensory inputs and is activated in close correlation with an individual's perceived urge-to-cough intensity [10]. The larger somatosensory response in healthy females, despite the lower provoking stimulus, suggests a possible mechanism for observed sex-related distribution of patients presenting to cough clinics.…”

“…The maximum dose of capsaicin that could be inhaled without coughing was subsequently administered to assess brain activations associated with the urge-to-cough as previously described [9][10][11]. In brief, an 18 s challenge was repeated at 60 s intervals for a minimum of eight challenges.…”

Functional neuroimaging of placebo inhibition in capsaicin induced urge-to-cough

“…By modelling the variance in subjective ratings compared to the variance in stimulus intensity, it was shown that discrete sections of this network responded in either a stimulus-dependant or ratings dependant fashion, implying that they may be involved in different aspects of sensory processing (Figure 2) (Farrell, Cole, Chiapoco, Egan, & Mazzone, 2012). (Mazzone et al, 2007).…”

“…To account for the residual respiratory noise, additional regressors were incorporated into the general linear model as advocated by Birn et al and successfully implemented in previous studies (Birn, Murphy, Handwerker, & Bandettini, 2009;Farrell et al, 2012;Mazzone et al, 2011). In the whole brain MRI study these included regressors from cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), white matter and voxels with high standard deviation in the sagittal sinus.…”