Sex differences in pain

Abstract

Are there sex differences in pain? For experimentally delivered somatic stimuli, females have lower thresholds, greater ability to discriminate, higher pain ratings, and less tolerance of noxious stimuli than males. These differences, however, are small, exist only for certain forms of stimulation and are affected by many situational variables such as presence of disease, experimental setting, and even nutritive status. For endogenous pains, women report more multiple pains in more body regions than men. With no obvious underlying rationale, some painful diseases are more prevalent among females, others among males and, for many diseases, symptoms differ between females and males. Sex differences in attitudes exist that affect not only reporting, coping, and responses to treatment, but also measurement and treatment. So many variables are operative, however, that the most striking feature of sex differences in reported pain experience is the apparent overall lack of them. On the other hand, deduction from known biological sex differences suggests that these are powerful sex differences in the operation of pain mechanisms. First, the vaginal canal provides an additional route in women for internal trauma and invasion by pathological agents that puts them at greater risk for developing hyperalgesia in multiple body regions. Second, sex differences in temporal patterns are likely to give rise to sex differences in how pain is “learned” and stimuli are interpreted, a situation that could lead to a greater variability and wider range of pains without obvious peripheral pathology among females. Third, sex differences in the actions of sex hormones suggest pain-relevant differences in the operation of many neuroactive agents, opiate and nonopiate systems, nerve growth factor, and the sympathetic system. Thus, while inductive analysis of existing data demonstrate more similarities than differences in pain experience between females and males, deductive analysis suggests important operational sex differences in its production.

The prevalence of neuropathic pain after non-traumatic spinal cord lesion

“…23 For experimentally delivered somatic stimuli, females have lower thresholds, greater ability to discriminate, higher pain ratings and less tolerance of noxious stimuli than males. The gender difference found in the present study was therefore not unexpected, even though there are, to our knowledge, no previous reports on gender differences in the prevalence of neuropathic pain.…”

Inhibitory effect of estrogen receptor beta on P2X3 receptors during inflammation in rats

“…For example, some chronic diseases, including migraine, temporomandibular disorders, fibromyalgia, arthritis, and interstitial cystitis, are more prevalent in females [1,2]. Women usually display stronger pain perception and request more analgesics [3,4], while in pregnancy, increasing estrogen and progestogen have an anti-nociceptive role [5,6].…”

Gender related differences in pain in spinal cord injured individuals

“…However, a recent study has investigated the use of pain descriptors when classifying SCI pain and concluded that verbal descriptors alone are not su cient for pain classi®cation. 25 In non-SCI populations, women often report more numerous pain locations than men 17,19 and more severe pain. 18 This was not the case in our study, where no di erences were found.…”