The effect of two sites of high frequency vibration on cutaneous pain threshold

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of two sites of high frequency vibration on experimentally produced pain thresholds. Subjects were assigned to one of two experimental groups. Vibration was applied proximal to the site of pain threshold measurement in one group and distal to the measurement site in the other group. The cutaneous pain threshold was measured at the ulnar aspect of the wrist in both groups prior to, during, and following 5 min of vibration. Subjects were 30 right-handed, Caucasian males with a negative history of upper extremity dysfunction. A repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to analyze the data. There was a significant interaction between vibration site and time of pain threshold measurement. Post hoc analysis of that interaction indicated that a significant difference between experimental groups occurred only during vibration; the distal group values were significantly higher than the proximal group values (P less than 0.03). For the distal group, pain threshold values were significantly higher during vibration than pre vibration and post vibration (P less than 0.05). In the proximal group, there was no significant difference in pain threshold values across the 3 time periods. The results of this study indicate that vibration applied distal to the site of pain can provide temporary analgesia.

The Efficacy of Mechanical Vibration Analgesia for Relief of Heel Stick Pain in Neonates

“…6 In fact, percussion therapy was frequently used for amputee stump pain after the American Civil War and until the mid-1940s. [8][9][10][11][12][13][14] Currently, vibration is studied and utilized by practitioners from many diverse areas of medicine such as orthopedists, practitioners of sports medicine, chiropractics, dentists, and dermatology; however, neonatology has not been one of them. 8 Since the early 1960s the interest and use of vibration analgesia has steadily grown.…”

The effect of vibration on pain during local anaesthesia injections

“…In addition they selected McGill pain descriptors 17 to describe the pain experience. The McGill pain descriptors are 20 groups of words describing pain and are categorized into sensory (groups 1-10), affective (11)(12)(13)(14)(15), evaluative (16) and miscellaneous (17)(18)(19)(20) domains. These groupings describe sensory qualities in terms of temporal, spatial, pressure, thermal, and other properties, affective qualities in terms of tension, fear, and autonomic properties and evaluative quality that describes the overall subjective pain intensity.…”

“…8 In the orofacial region vibration stimuli are easily applied, and have been used to raise the pain threshold; [9][10][11] to relieve pain of dental origin whether pulpal, periodontal, or post-surgical; 12 to help manage chronic intractable orofacial pain 2 and acute or chronic musculoskeletal pain. 5,13 Furthermore, it has been suggested that pain reduction is greatest in the orofacial region if the source of vibration is applied not only within the area directly affected by pain, but when the firmness of vibration application stimulates the underlying bone on the same side as the pain.…”

Pain threshold changes by skin vibratory stimulation in healthy subjects

“…Skin vibratory stimulation can modulate different sensory modalities. For instance it increases the sensory threshold to heat (Wall & Cronly-Dillon 1960), to pain induced by electrical stimuli applied either to the skin (Wall & Cronly-Dillon 1960, Pertoovara 1979, Sherer et al 1986 or to the tooth pulp (Ekblom & Hansson 1982), and to vibratory stimuli themselves (Ferrington et a/. 1977).…”

“…There is disagreement on the most appropriate sites of application of conditioning and test stimuli. According to some authors (Sherer et al 1986), conditioning vibratory stimuli must be applied distally to the test painful stimuli, but proximally according to others (Pertoovara 1979).…”