Electrical neurostimulation for chronic pain: on selective relay of sensory neural activities in myelinated nerve fibers

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Sacré, Pierre, Sarma, Sridevi V., Guan, Yun, Anderson, William S.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2015
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author Sacré, Pierre
Sarma, Sridevi V.
Guan, Yun
Anderson, William S.
author_facet Sacré, Pierre
Sarma, Sridevi V.
Guan, Yun
Anderson, William S.
contents Chronic pain affects about 100 million adults in the US. Despite their great need, neuropharmacology and neurostimulation therapies for chronic pain have been associated with suboptimal efficacy and limited long-term success, as their mechanisms of action are unclear. Yet current computational models of pain transmission suffer from several limitations. In particular, dorsal column models do not include the fundamental underlying sensory activity traveling in these nerve fibers. We developed a (simple) simulation test bed of electrical neurostimulation of myelinated nerve fibers with underlying sensory activity. This paper reports our findings so far. Interactions between stimulation-evoked and underlying activities are mainly due to collisions of action potentials and losses of excitability due to the refractory period following an action potential. In addition, intuitively, the reliability of sensory activity decreases as the stimulation frequency increases. This first step opens the door to a better understanding of pain transmission and its modulation by neurostimulation therapies.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_1507_02716
institution arXiv
publishDate 2015
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Electrical neurostimulation for chronic pain: on selective relay of sensory neural activities in myelinated nerve fibers
Sacré, Pierre
Sarma, Sridevi V.
Guan, Yun
Anderson, William S.
Neurons and Cognition
Chronic pain affects about 100 million adults in the US. Despite their great need, neuropharmacology and neurostimulation therapies for chronic pain have been associated with suboptimal efficacy and limited long-term success, as their mechanisms of action are unclear. Yet current computational models of pain transmission suffer from several limitations. In particular, dorsal column models do not include the fundamental underlying sensory activity traveling in these nerve fibers. We developed a (simple) simulation test bed of electrical neurostimulation of myelinated nerve fibers with underlying sensory activity. This paper reports our findings so far. Interactions between stimulation-evoked and underlying activities are mainly due to collisions of action potentials and losses of excitability due to the refractory period following an action potential. In addition, intuitively, the reliability of sensory activity decreases as the stimulation frequency increases. This first step opens the door to a better understanding of pain transmission and its modulation by neurostimulation therapies.
title Electrical neurostimulation for chronic pain: on selective relay of sensory neural activities in myelinated nerve fibers
topic Neurons and Cognition
url https://arxiv.org/abs/1507.02716