Spinal and Supra-Spinal Pain Mechanisms in Patients With Fibromyalgia
Status:
Recruiting
Trial end date:
2022-03-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Fibromyalgia (FM) patients have increased windup (WU). However, WU of FM patients is only
quantitatively but not qualitatively different from healthy controls (HC). Thus WU
abnormalities of FM patients could be the result of supra-spinal and not the result of spinal
pain mechanisms. The study team will test this hypothesis by sensitizing FM patients with
topical capsaicin. The study team hypothesize that at baseline the slopes of sensitivity
adjusted WU of FM patients are not statistically different from HC. However, after capsaicin
application, the slopes of sensitivity adjusted WU will be significantly different from
baseline and greater than those of HC, suggesting central sensitization. This would imply
that FM patients are sensitive to heat pain but not sensitized.