Extended viewing of movements of the intact hand in a mirror as well as motor imagery has been shown to decrease pain in phantom pain patients. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging to assess the neural correlates of mirrored, imagined and executed hand movements in 14 upper extremity amputees - 7 with phantom limb pain (PLP) and 7 without phantom limb pain (non-PLP) and 9 healthy contr...

two patients with phantom pain were selected for the study. after a positive response to segmental nerve blockade at the l4 and l5 nerve roots, prf was performed on the l4 and l5 dorsal root ganglia. global clinical improvement was good in one patient, with a 40% decrease in pain on the visual analogue scale (vas) in 6 months, and moderate in the second patient, with a 30% decrease in pain scor...

P ERSISTENT pain after limb amputation is common, most often taking the form of phantom limb pain or localized pain in the residual portion of the limb (stump pain). The conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq have brought this to the forefront: in a report appearing in 2008, of the 8,058 reported military casualties in US military personnel, 5,684 (70.5%) had major limb injuries; and 423 (7.4%) of p...

OBJECTIVE To prospectively study factors associated with the occurrence of phantom sensations and pains in a pre-selected sample of child and adolescent amputees reporting phantom limbs. DESIGN Prospective diary study over 1 month. PARTICIPANTS Fourteen child and adolescent amputees from 10-18 years of age who were missing a limb due to trauma (n = 12) or congenital limb deficiency (n = 2),...

Twenty-five subjects, who had undergone amputation within last 6 weeks, were studied for psychiatric complications, including phantom limb phenomena. The patients were interviewed on SCID, HRSD and HARS. Out of a total of 25 subjects, 8 (34.6%) developed psychiatric disorders - PTSD and major depression. The whole sample was thus divided into 2 groups-sick and nonsick. Phantom limb was seen in ...

OBJECTIVE To test the feasibility and preliminary efficacy of self-delivered home-based mirror therapy for phantom pain. DESIGN Uncontrolled prospective treatment outcome pilot study. PARTICIPANTS Forty community-dwelling adults with unilateral amputation and phantom pain > 3 on a 0-10 numeric rating scale enrolled either during a one-time study visit (n = 30) or remotely (n = 10). METHOD...

Phantom limb pain is experienced by nearly 50 - 80% of the patients following limb amputation. The anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) is a part of the limbic system that is an essential component in mediating the affective and emotional component of pain responses. To explore the role of ACC in the phantom limb pain, we recorded evoked excitatory postsynaptic potentials (EPSPs), cortical network a...

Supernumerary phantom limb (SPL) resulting from spinal cord lesions are very rare, with only sporadic and brief descriptions in the literature. Furthermore, the reported cases of SPL typically occurred in neurologically incomplete spinal cord patients. Here, we report a rare case of SPL with phantom limb pain that occurred after traumatic spinal cord injury in a neurologically complete patient....