Shedding light on pain for the clinic: a comprehensive review of using functional near-infrared spectroscopy to monitor its process in the brain

Hu, Xiao‐Su; Nascimento, Thiago D.; DaSilva, Alexandre F.

doi:10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002293

Cited by 12 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 179 publications

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“…Quantitative analysis showed that changes in the [HbO 2 ] signal acquired by fNIRS contributed 73-79% to the measured changes in total hemoglobin concentration (Hu et al, 2021). Therefore, this Comparison of activation levels in the prefrontal cortex (BA9, BA10, BA46) and motor area (BA6) with or without music intervention.…”

Section: The Fnirs Signal May Reflect Changes In Pain Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 86%

“…Nowadays, more scholars choose to use fNIRS for pain study, mainly because of its high temporal resolution, small size, portability, ease of wear, and insensitivity to motion artifacts. It can be used to objectively evaluate the level of brain response by measuring changes in blood flow in the cerebral cortex and thus it can be used to study the brain's response to nociception (Hu et al, 2021). It also has great potential for objective pain assessment in clinical settings and has been valued.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A study based on functional near-infrared spectroscopy: Cortical responses to music interventions in patients with myofascial pain syndrome

Zhang

Shi²,

Du³

et al. 2023

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

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ObjectThis study measured cerebral blood oxygen changes in patients with myofascial pain syndrome (MPS) using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS). The aim was to investigate the effect of music intervention on pain relief in MPS patients.Materials and methodsA total of 15 patients with MPS participated in this study. A self-controlled block task design was used to collect the oxy-hemoglobin ([HbO2]) and deoxy-hemoglobin ([HbR]) concentrations in the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and motor cortex using fNIRS. The cerebral cortex response and channel connectivity were further analyzed. In the experiment, the therapist was asked to apply compression of 3–4 kg/cm2 vertically using the thumb to induce pain. Soothing synthetic music with frequencies of 8–150 Hz and 50–70 dB was used as the audio for the music intervention.ResultCompared to the group without music intervention, the activation of brain regions showed a decreasing trend in the group with music intervention under the onset of pain. The results of paired t-tests showed that nine of the data were significantly different (p < 0.05). It was also found that with music intervention, inter-channel connectivity was diminished. Besides, their dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (dlPFC) was significantly correlated with the anterior prefrontal cortex (aPFC) for pain response (r = 0.82), and weakly correlated with the premotor cortex (r = 0.40).ConclusionThis study combines objective assessment indicators and subjective scale assessments to demonstrate that appropriate music interventions can be effective in helping to relieve pain to some extent. The analgesic mechanisms between relevant brain regions under music intervention were explored in depth. New insights into effective analgesic methods and quantitative assessment of pain conditions are presented.

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Section: The Fnirs Signal May Reflect Changes In Pain Conditionsmentioning

confidence: 86%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A study based on functional near-infrared spectroscopy: Cortical responses to music interventions in patients with myofascial pain syndrome

Zhang

Shi²,

Du³

et al. 2023

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…MRI is a major and often used technique in the context of human brain imaging in pain research, but there are also other related techniques. One example is functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) that allows, similarly to fMRI, to assess hemodynamic activity in the brain (Hu et al, 2021;Karunakaran et al, 2021). While fNIRS has the major advantage that it is portable and thus can be also used at the bedside, its measures are restricted to brain regions near the cortical surface.…”

Section: Brain Imagingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Measuring pain and nociception: Through the glasses of a computational scientist. Transdisciplinary overview of methods

Kutafina

Becker²,

Namer³

2023

Front. Netw. Physiol.

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In a healthy state, pain plays an important role in natural biofeedback loops and helps to detect and prevent potentially harmful stimuli and situations. However, pain can become chronic and as such a pathological condition, losing its informative and adaptive function. Efficient pain treatment remains a largely unmet clinical need. One promising route to improve the characterization of pain, and with that the potential for more effective pain therapies, is the integration of different data modalities through cutting edge computational methods. Using these methods, multiscale, complex, and network models of pain signaling can be created and utilized for the benefit of patients. Such models require collaborative work of experts from different research domains such as medicine, biology, physiology, psychology as well as mathematics and data science. Efficient work of collaborative teams requires developing of a common language and common level of understanding as a prerequisite. One of ways to meet this need is to provide easy to comprehend overviews of certain topics within the pain research domain. Here, we propose such an overview on the topic of pain assessment in humans for computational researchers. Quantifications related to pain are necessary for building computational models. However, as defined by the International Association of the Study of Pain (IASP), pain is a sensory and emotional experience and thus, it cannot be measured and quantified objectively. This results in a need for clear distinctions between nociception, pain and correlates of pain. Therefore, here we review methods to assess pain as a percept and nociception as a biological basis for this percept in humans, with the goal of creating a roadmap of modelling options.

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“…In addition, the higher resolution of fNIRS can provide more physiological information, such as heart rate variability (HRV) [21,22]. In the field of pain, an increasing number of fNIRS-based investigations have been developed [23,24]. In this study, owing to the noise level requirements of mindfulness meditation, and the use of electronic VR devices, we selected fNIRS as the neuroimaging technique to study the VRB and TMB practices by focusing on the key cortical regions for sensory processing and inhibition.…”

Section: Objectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Brain Mechanisms of Virtual Reality Breathing Versus Traditional Mindful Breathing in Pain Modulation: Observational Functional Near-infrared Spectroscopy Study

Hu¹,

Beard²,

Sherbel³

et al. 2021

J Med Internet Res

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Background Pain is a complex experience that involves sensory-discriminative and cognitive-emotional neuronal processes. It has long been known across cultures that pain can be relieved by mindful breathing (MB). There is a common assumption that MB exerts its analgesic effect through interoception. Interoception refers to consciously refocusing the mind’s attention to the physical sensation of internal organ function. Objective In this study, we dissect the cortical analgesic processes by imaging the brains of healthy subjects exposed to traditional MB (TMB) and compare them with another group for which we augmented MB to an outside sensory experience via virtual reality breathing (VRB). Methods The VRB protocol involved in-house–developed virtual reality 3D lungs that synchronized with the participants’ breathing cycles in real time, providing them with an immersive visual-auditory exteroception of their breathing. Results We found that both breathing interventions led to a significant increase in pain thresholds after week-long practices, as measured by a thermal quantitative sensory test. However, the underlying analgesic brain mechanisms were opposite, as revealed by functional near-infrared spectroscopy data. In the TMB practice, the anterior prefrontal cortex uniquely modulated the premotor cortex. This increased its functional connection with the primary somatosensory cortex (S1), thereby facilitating the S1-based sensory-interoceptive processing of breathing but inhibiting its other role in sensory-discriminative pain processing. In contrast, virtual reality induced an immersive 3D exteroception with augmented visual-auditory cortical activations, which diminished the functional connection with the S1 and consequently weakened the pain processing function of the S1. Conclusions In summary, our study suggested two analgesic neuromechanisms of VRB and TMB practices—exteroception and interoception—that distinctively modulated the S1 processing of the ascending noxious inputs. This is in line with the concept of dualism (Yin and Yang).

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Shedding light on pain for the clinic: a comprehensive review of using functional near-infrared spectroscopy to monitor its process in the brain

Cited by 12 publications

References 179 publications

A study based on functional near-infrared spectroscopy: Cortical responses to music interventions in patients with myofascial pain syndrome

A study based on functional near-infrared spectroscopy: Cortical responses to music interventions in patients with myofascial pain syndrome

Measuring pain and nociception: Through the glasses of a computational scientist. Transdisciplinary overview of methods

Brain Mechanisms of Virtual Reality Breathing Versus Traditional Mindful Breathing in Pain Modulation: Observational Functional Near-infrared Spectroscopy Study

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