Tactile Precision Remains Intact When Acute Neck Pain Is Induced

Peer Review #1 of "Modernising tactile acuity assessment; clinimetrics of semi-automated tests and effects of age, sex and anthropometry on performance (v0.1)"

“…orientation of caliper, number of reversals), for which no standard is available [60,61]. Yet, mean (SD) TPDT scores appeared similar to several other reports (mean (SD) range: 45.9 (18.4) to 62.6 (22.9)) [33,39,45,63], although somewhat higher than others (mean (SD) range: 21.7 (6.2) to 35.2 (9.6)) [43,48,64]. Further, measurement error may depend on various factors related to both participants and assessors included [33].…”

“…This may be of clinical relevance, given that treatment success in manual sensory discrimination interventions could be limited by the need for caregiver involvement during at home training [41]. However, despite neck pain being ranked among the top five leading causes of years lived with disability globally [42], only a limited number of these novel procedures have been applied to the neck [39,[43][44][45]. As such, the body of knowledge about tactile acuity in neck pain appears limited compared to other painful conditions [46].…”

Reliabilities of the Two-Point Discrimination Test and the Two-Point Estimation Test for Use in the Lumbar Spine Area in Healthy Young Adults

“…The differences between both studies included the size of the study populations (37 participants in our study vs. 21 in Adamczyk et al, 2016), the place of measurement (15 cm from the spinal axis in our study and a distance of 5 cm and only on the left side in Adamczyk et al (2016), and the participants’ sex (both sexes in our study and males only in Adamczyk et al (2016). The “better” results of the TPD precision test which are found in Adamczyk’s works could also be affected by the fact that the examiners had extensive experience in this type of measurements, and they had previously participated in a few projects associated with the assessment of superficial sensation (Adamczyk et al, 2016, 2018a, 2018b, 2019b). This can be demonstrated indirectly by the average TPD values on the left side of the body.…”

Tactile acuity improves during acute experimental pain of the limb

“…55,56 Interestingly though, our findings contrast with recent findings in experimentally induced low back pain, where tactile acuity deteriorated 3 and neck pain, where tactile acuity remained intact, although the authors hypothesised an improvement. 1 The 2 notable differences between ours and the 2 existing experimental pain studies are the pain induction method and the body site tested. The former is arguably less important, given that Adamczyk et al used the same method in both their studies and reported conflicting results.…”

“…1,3 Adamczyk et al first reported tactile acuity deterioration following induction of low back pain 3 ; however, the same authors reported that tactile acuity did not change with neck pain. 1 Both induced pain with hypertonic saline injection; the authors suggested that the conflict might be due to the differences in anatomical site being tested. 1 Besides an investigation over 48 hours (delayed onset muscle soreness) in the upper limb, 21 we are unaware of any investigation into tactile acuity in experimental limb pain.…”