IMR Press / JIN / Volume 20 / Issue 2 / DOI: 10.31083/j.jin2002044
Open Access Brief Report
The diagnostic value of pain evoked potential by electrical stimulation combined with noceciptive blink reflex in trigeminal neuralgia
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1 Department of Functional Neurosurgery, Sanbo Brain Hospital, Capital Medical University, 100093 Beijing, China
2 Department of Neurology, Sanbo Brain Hospital, Capital Medical University, 100093 Beijing, China
*Correspondence: luangm@ccmu.edu.cn (Guoming Luan)
J. Integr. Neurosci. 2021, 20(2), 425–429; https://doi.org/10.31083/j.jin2002044
Submitted: 22 February 2021 | Revised: 9 March 2021 | Accepted: 12 April 2021 | Published: 30 June 2021
Copyright: © 2021 The Author(s). Published by IMR Press.
This is an open access article under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Abstract

Microvascular decompression is the first choice for treating the primary trigeminal neuralgia to provide the most extended duration of pain freedom. However, in microvascular decompression, we found that this kind of operation is only suitable for some patients. It is of great value to objectively judge the function and abnormality of the trigeminal pain conduction pathway in guiding the operation process. This brief report investigates the value of pain evoked potential by electrical stimulation and noceciptive blink reflex in trigeminal neuralgia. We detected the pain evoked potential in 34 patients with trigeminal neuralgia and 48 healthy controls treated by electrical stimulation and blink reflex. We demonstrated no significant differences in the latencies of V1, V2, V3, and R2 of the affected side and the contralateral side in patients with trigeminal neuralgia. The latencies of those four indicators of the affected side in patients with trigeminal neuralgia were notably decreased compared to those on the same side in healthy controls. The receiver operating characteristic curve analysis showed that the area under curve, sensitivity and specificity of the combined diagnosis of latency and amplitude were significantly higher than the single diagnosis. The latency and amplitude of V1 were highly sensitive, while those of V2 was highly specific. Trigeminal neuralgia can be effectively diagnosed by combining pain evoked potential by electrical stimulation and noceciptive blink reflex. The pathogenesis of trigeminal neuralgia should be combined with peripheral pathogenicity and the theory of central pathogenicity.

Keywords
Trigeminal neuralgia
Electrical stimulation
Pain evoked potential
Noceciptive blink reflex
Figures
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