For almost a century it is discussed that activity in the sympathetic nervous system may be involved in the generation of pain, e.g., in causalgia and reflex sympathetic dystrophy. This assumption is based mainly upon two observations: (1) the pain is spatially correlated with signs of autonomic dysfunction, i.e., with abnormalities in blood flow and sweating, as well as with trophic changes, a...

background: there is inconsistent information about the role of psychological factors in the incidence of reflex sympathetic dystrophy (rsd) in patients with distal radius fractures. the present study was thus undertaken to evaluate the relationship between some of these factors and the occurrence of reflex sympathetic dystrophy in patients with distal radius fracture.   methods: one hundred an...

A 15 year old girl who had pain, oedema of her left hand, and fever of four months' duration is described. Marked demineralisation of her hand was shown by radiography, and increased articular uptake by technetium-99m bone scan. All these changes were indistinguishable from reflex sympathetic dystrophy. After two admissions to hospital and multiple explorations we discovered that she had induce...

Reflex sympathetic dystrophy of the knee has been studied in a series of 19 patients. Those diagnosed and treated early (at less than six months) did much better than those diagnosed and treated late. Nevertheless, when these patients were followed up at an average of 3.4 years from onset, not one was completely normal to objective tests with the Cybex II dynameter, an indication of the adverse...