Repeatability of autonomic responses to pain anticipation and pain stimulation

Abstract

In this study we address the problem of the repeatability of autonomic responses in the experimental setting. In healthy volunteers, we measured the heart rate (HR) response to pain anticipation and to pain elicited with galvanic stimulation. After evaluation of pain threshold (T), all subjects underwent the same experimental protocol, whereby a painful stimulus at 1.5T was delivered on the forehead following a warning, while the ECG was continuously recorded. The procedure was repeated three times across a three-week period. The parameters recorded included pain threshold, pain rating, HR response to pain anticipation and HR response to pain. We found a high correlation among the three sessions for all parameters, indicating that, as occurs for pain threshold and pain rating, individual differences in autonomic responses can be reliably reproduced as well, even though significant habituation develops.

Pain and soreness associated with a percutaneous electrical stimulation muscle cramping protocol

“…The immediate poststimulation reduction in pain (50%, 13.5 to 6.5 mm) and soreness (74%, 8.5 to 2.2 mm) between Days 1 and 2 suggests a learning effect or adaptation. Accommodation to stimulation intensity can occur shortly after application,12 and pain has been observed to decrease with repeated electrical stimulation 5, 9, 10. Pain and soreness do not appear to decrease significantly following the second day of testing; thus, one testing session is sufficient for pain and soreness accommodation.…”

Heart rate variability and experimentally induced pain in healthy adults: A systematic review

“…BP (Bruehl and Chung, ) and heart rate (HR) are products of autonomic reactivity, and have been extensively studied to specify the relationship between pain stimuli and autonomic reactions (Möltner et al., ; Tousignant‐Laflamme et al., ; Colloca et al., ; Loggia et al., ). HRV, by contrast, attempts to tease out the relative contributions of sympathetic and parasympathetic activity underlying autonomic reactivity and furthermore serves as an index of baroreflex activity (Casadei et al., ; Moak et al., ; Goldstein et al., ), and may therefore be more appropriate to investigate autonomic nervous system (ANS) reactivity to nociceptive stimulation.…”

Automatic pain quantification using autonomic parameters.

“…In the area of pure research, many studies have been performed to determine correlations between the autonomic nervous system (primary electrocardiogram and galvanic skin conductance) and pain stimulation (Colloca, Benedetti, & Pollo, 2006;Cortelli & Pierangeli, 2003;Jeanne, Logier, De Jonckheere, & Tavernier, 2009;Korhonen & Yli-Hankala, 2009;Ledowski, Ang, Schmarbeck, & Rhodes, 2009;Loggia, Juneau, & Bushnell, 2011;Schlereth & Birklein, 2008). However, these studies only examined the correlation between a single biopotential parameter (Treister, Kliger, Zuckerman, Goor Aryeh, & Eisenberg, 2012) and were not oriented toward applied research.…”