Electrical Skin Resistance Test in Evaluation of Peripheral Nerve Injuries

Abstract

as a practical test in the evaluation of injuries of peripheral nerves. This method, in contrast to the sensory examination, does not depend on the cooperation of the patient. It can therefore be used with uncooperative, or even unconscious, patients and may give objective results in cases of hysteria or suspected malingering. Richter and Katz examined 10 patients with injury of the ulnar nerve and found a correlation of skin resistance with sensory changes in most of them. Of the 27 patients with various peripheral nerve lesions studied by Jasper and Robb, all but 2 showed a correlation of the areas of increased skin resistance with the areas of sensory loss. This method is now being used on a large scale in the evaluation of

Neuroeffector characteristics of sweat glands in the human hand activated by regular neural stimuli.

“…The stimulation probably coactivated cutaneous vasoconstrictor fibres but since no significant changes of skin temperature occurred, it is unlikely that the vasoconstrictor activation affected the sweat responses. In agreement with previous anatomical data (Guttmann, 1940;Richter & Katz, 1943;Herz, Glaser, Moldover & Hoen, 1946) the correspondance between mechanoreceptor afferent sensory fields and sympathetically innervated fields was essentially good.…”

Involvement of peripheral vasomotor fibres in carpal tunnel syndrome.

“…The information obtained indicated that studies of peripheral autonomic function had a definite place in the objective, clinical evaluation of patients in whom the lesion was complete. In patients with incomplete peripheral nerve lesions, however, such studies were found to be of much more limited practical value, at least when attention was confined to the integrity of sudomotor fibres (Herz et al, 1946). The experience gained in the present work on vasomotor function might be taken to substantiate this belief.…”

“…Before the introduction of modern electrodiagnostic techniques for the study of nerve conduction velocity, a number of studies were undertaken on sudomotor and vasomotor function in patients with peripheral nerve injuries sustained usually while on military service (Doupe, 1943;Jasper and Robb, 1945;Herz et al, 1946). The information obtained indicated that studies of peripheral autonomic function had a definite place in the objective, clinical evaluation of patients in whom the lesion was complete.…”

“…The afferent pathways subserving the reflex remain unknown, but the efferent fibres mediating it are sympathetic. Sympathetic nerve fibres have the same peripheral distribution as the somatic branch of the peripheral nerve which contains them (Sunderland, 1968), and there is a correspondence of cutaneous areas of sensory and sympathetic loss after severe nerve injuries (Herz et al, 1946). In the present study, therefore, the integrity of the inspiratory digital vasoconstrictor reflex has been studied in a medianand an ulnar-innervated finger in patients with the carpal tunnel syndrome.…”