Premium
Filtering out repetitive auditory stimuli in fibromyalgia: A study of P50 sensory gating
Author(s) -
CarrillodelaPeña M.T.,
Triñanes Y.,
GonzálezVillar A.,
GómezPerretta C.,
GarcíaLarrea L.
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
european journal of pain
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.305
H-Index - 109
eISSN - 1532-2149
pISSN - 1090-3801
DOI - 10.1002/ejp.627
Subject(s) - sensory gating , habituation , audiology , stimulus modality , sensory system , sensory processing , fibromyalgia , gating , psychology , nociception , somatosensory system , medicine , neuroscience , physical therapy , receptor
Background It has been suggested that fibromyalgia ( FM ) patients show increased sensory processing of nociceptive and non‐nociceptive stimuli and also reduced habituation. Although this pattern of increased reactivity has been established for the somatosensory modality, its generalization to other sensory modalities remains controversial. Methods Auditory evoked potentials were obtained using a paired‐stimuli paradigm from a sample of 52 FM female patients and 55 healthy women matched for age and socio‐economic status. Sensory gating of the P50 component, as indicated by P50 suppression rates to the second identical stimuli, was analysed in relation to clinical indices of FM , including algometry of tender points and a number of self‐reported questionnaires. Results Sensory gating mechanisms in FM patients proved to be normal, robust and as efficient as those recorded in control subjects. There was no correlation between P50 suppression rates and indices of clinical or experimental (threshold or tolerance) pain. In addition, P50 sensory gating was not related to the other main symptoms of FM , including fatigue, sleep dysfunction or co‐morbid depression, nor to hypersensitivity to noise or headache. Conclusions The results indicate that FM patients do not present significant deficits in early sensory gating when processing auditory stimuli, and therefore challenge the ‘generalized hypersensitivity’ hypothesis of FM.