Wk 5: Pain concepts and assessment Flashcards
Define pain
Sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or
potential tissue damage, or described in terms of such damage’
Key points of pain
- a different pheromone for each person
- pt is the authority of their own pain
What are some types of pain?
Times
- Acute (at time of healing)
- chronic/persistent (3-6 months)
Pathways of pain
- Nociceptic (common pain, something wrong with specific tissue)
* Somatic (tissues)
* Vicera (organ tissue)
* chances with movement
e.g. bee stings, muscle injury
- Neuropathic (damaging to the nervous system)
* nerve
* something wrong with NS.
e.g. nerves, pinching, disease
*more likely to be chronic
What are the elements of the nociceptive pain response?
- Transduction
- Transmission
- Perception
- Modulation
What are the three pathways of the NS?
- afferent pathway (asending to the brain)
- Central nervous system (where pain is percieved)
- efferent pathway (motor pathways that come down from CNS)
What are key features of the afferent pathway?
- hold nociceptors (pain receptors)
- afferent nerve fibres
- spinal cord network
- terminated in the dorsal horn of the spinal cord
What are key features of the CNS pathway?
The portions involved in the interpretation of the pain
signals:
* the limbic system
* reticular formation
* thalamus
* hypothalamus
* cortex
What are key features of the efferent pathway?
Composed of the fibres connecting:
* reticular formation (projections into that thalamus)
* midbrain (cantain nerves and nucli)
* substantia gelatinosa in dorsal horn (recieves different types of sensory information)
What are nociceptors? and what are the two types?
Sensory receptors (nerve endings) activated by noxious stimuli, transmit impulses via C fibre and A‐delta fibres
Distributed in:
somatic structures
- skin, muscles, connective tissue, bones, joints);
visceral structures
- visceral organs such as liver, gastro‐ intestinal tract)
What is the speed of C and A-delta fibres?
C fibres: slow
A-delta: fast
Describe transduction
= initial response to injury
- release of chemical mediators
- conversion of energy types
- generation of action potential
Describe chemical mediators of pain
- Prostaglandins (lipid compunds, mediators of alleri/inflamatory reaction so pain and swelling)
- Substance P (vaso dilator, NT, regulates excitability of dorsal horn)
- Histamine (Mast cells) (increase blood flwo, fluid and protien rush to the tissue space= red and swelling)
- Bradykinins (vasodilators and tissue swellers)
- Serotonin (NT released by platlets)
- Potassium (important for opening and closing of potasium channels and creation of action patential)
- Others
Describe the three phases of transmission
Three phases:
1) Injury site to spinal cord
- A‐delta and C fibres
2) Spinal cord to brain stem and thalamus
3) Thalamus to cortex
Describe the asending pathway
ascending = sensory
From nociceptors to brain
- Complex transmission from periphery to dorsal
root of spinal cord
- Terminate in dorsal horn
- Signals communicate with local interneurons
- Neurons with long axons ascend to brain
Describe the desending pathway
descending= motor
From brain to spinal dorsal horn
Can be modulated
- release of chemical substances
- Gate theory
- Actions
Selective response to stimuli
Describe perception
Conscious experience of pain (ouch!) (comes through afferent pathway)
* Reticular activating system (RAS)
* Somatosensory system
* Limbic system
* Cortical structures
Describe modulation and its part of the pathway
Signals from brain travelling downwards
Release of chemical substances
- Endogenous opioids
* Encephalins
* Endorphins
- Serotonin
- Noradrenaline (norepinephrine)
= Amplification of dampening/modulation of the pain system
What are some impacts on modulation?
- Occurs at all levels of the nervous system
- Signals enhanced or inhibited
- Influences pain perception
- Helps explain variability in pain experience
- The “Gate Theory”
Describe delta fibres
- Thinly myelinated
- Large diameter
- Fast-conducting fibres
- Transmit well-localised, sharp pain
- Sensitive to mechanical and thermal stimuli
Transmit signals rapidly: associated with acute pain.
Describe C fibres
- Unmyelinated, small diameter
- Slow-conducting
- Transmit poorly localised, dull and aching pain
- Sensitive to mechanical, thermal, chemical stimuli
- Activation associated with diffuse, dull, persistent pain
- more relted to persistant pain but can be both
Describe delta A fibres
- Highly myelinated
- Large diameter
- Rapid-conducting
- Low activation threshold
- Respond to light touch, transmit
**non-noxious stimuli - Gate theory: tactile non‐noxious stimuli inhibits pain signal transmission
What are the types of somatic pain? and what body parts do they impact?
Superficial somatic
– Skin
– Mucous membranes
– Subcutaneous tissues
Deep somatic
– Muscles
– Bones
– Fascia
– Tendons
– Joints
– Ligaments
– Blood vessels
What impacts pain perception?
- previous experince
What is modulation?
- the inhibition or enchantment of signals
- Occurs at all levels of the nervous system
- Influences pain perception
- Helps explain variability in pain experience
Explain the gate control theory?
- Gate controlled by dynamic function of certain
cells in dorsal horn that stops some impulse getting to the brain. - Substantia gelantinosa within dorsal horn is
anatomical location of gate
Pain experience dependent on:
- amount of information that gets “through”
the gate to the brain
- Competition between large and small fibres
- Competition between pain fibres and non pain fibres
- amount of downward signaling from brain
- Endogenous chemical release
Descending & ascending fibres meet at the gate
- Gate open/closed depending on information received from various sources
- T cells within dorsal horn facilitates the opening &
closing
- Activity such as touch can close the gate
e.g. rubbing the injured site
What are some examples of things that help close the pain ‘gate’
- rubbing
- heat
- tens machine in labour
What is the purpose of pain? and what impacts it?
- Necessary, protective mechanism
- Subjective experience, not necessarily consequential just from an external stimulus
Complex interplay of multiple factors
– Biological
– Psychological/affective
– Sociological
Explain how pain can be contextual?
You may not feel pain at the time as your focous is else where. e.g. soldiger in battle
different to a women in labour expecting a baby
What are the classifications of pain?
Actue or persistant
Neuropathic
Somatoform (psychogenic)
- no identifiable casue but person feels pain e.g psychogenic
Nociceptive
- viceral
- somatic
Others inlcude
- referred pain
- phantom pain
- cancer pain
- intractable pain
- Breakthrough pain
Describe acute pain
- sudden onset
- mild or significant
- duration is dependant on the healing
- sympathetic signs e.g. hypertension, tachy
- is protective pain that indicates something
- can be deep or supericial
- can be apart of a /acute pain cycle’ that recurrent acute episodes e.g. migrane or angina
*life may be distrupted with the pain and then anticipation of pain