OBJECTIVE To observe the temporal changes of basic fibroblast growth factor (FGF-2) expression in the spinal cord of a rat model of spared nerve injury (SNI) of the sciatic nerve. METHODS A total of 100 male SD rats were randomly divided into sham-operated group and SNI group. The paw withdrawal threshold to mechanical stimulation was recorded at 1 day before and at 1, 4, 7, 14 and 28 days af...

PURPOSE/OBJECTIVES To develop and test an instrument to measure the spiritual needs of patients near the end of life. DESIGN Instrumentation methodology. SETTING One inpatient and five outpatient hospices. SAMPLE 62 female and 38 male hospice patients with a mean age of 67 years; most were Caucasian, Protestant, and dying of cancer. METHODS Items for the Spiritual Needs Inventory (SNI) ...

OBJECTIVE To investigate the effects of electroacupuncture (EA) on mRNA and protein expression of agrin, acetylcholine receptor (AChR)-ε and AChR-γ in a rat model of tibialis anterior muscle atrophy induced by sciatic nerve injection injury, and to examine the underlying mechanism of action. METHODS Fifty-four adult Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into four groups: healthy control group (CON...

The present study investigated the role of metabotropic glutamate receptor subtype 8 (mGluR8) in the dorsal striatum (DS) in modulating thermonociception and rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM) ON and OFF cell activities in conditions of neuropathic pain induced by spared nerve injury (SNI) of the sciatic nerve in rats. The role of DS mGluR8 on mechanical allodynia was also investigated. Intra-D...

Peripheral nerve injury causes spontaneous and long-lasting pain, hyperalgesia, and allodynia. Excitatory amino acid receptor-dependent increases in descending facilitatory drive from the brainstem rostral ventromedial medulla (RVM) contribute to injury-evoked hypersensitivity. Although increased excitability likely reflects changes in synaptic efficacy, the cellular mechanisms underlying injur...

To study the neuropathic pain mechanism, various behavioral responses of animals in to different neuropathic models were considered. Adult male Sprague-Dawley rats weighing 230-280 g were used. Anesthesia was initially induced with pentobarbital I.P. (50 mg/kg). These models included (1): chronic constriction injury (CCI) by loose ligation of the sciatic nerve (2) Spared nerve injury (SNI) by a...

Corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) is a peptide involved in the activation of the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. CRF is distributed not only along the HPA axis but also throughout pain-relevant anatomical sites. CRF elicits potent antinociception at the three main levels of pain transmissions: namely, the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral sensory neurons. The widespread distribut...

Auditing complex SNA networks is a scarcely explored area, confronting the reviewers with a number of distinct, though related questions such as: what are the measures for security and internal control integrated in the networks, what are their strengths and weaknesses, how can one verify their effectiveness, and how are the measures impacted by interconnecting networks? From an EDP-auditor's p...

The ability of divalent manganese to enter neurons via calcium channels makes manganese an excellent MRI contrast agent for the imaging of nociception, the afferent neuronal encoding of pain perception. There is growing evidence that nociceptive neurons possess increased expression and activity of calcium channels, which would allow for the selective accumulation of manganese at these sites. In...

Human brain imaging studies suggest that chronic neuropathic pain has a strong emotional component that is mediated by medial prefrontal cortex (mPFC) activity; in rodents, the mPFC is involved in emotional and cognitive aspects of behavior, including the extinction of Pavlovian fear conditioning. Together, these findings suggest that the cortex may modulate the memory trace of pain. As D-cyclo...