What is Neuropathic pain - Meaning and definition

Published by Roberto Wenk. Reviewed by Alison Ramsey. Last updated date: January 16, 2019.

Pain caused by a lesion or disease of the somatosensory nervous system.

Neuropathic pain is a clinical description (and not a diagnosis) that requires a demonstrable lesion or a disease that satisfies established neurological diagnostic criteria.

Lesion: diagnostic investigations (e.g., imaging, neurophysiology, biopsies, lab tests) reveal an abnormality or when there was obvious trauma.
Disease: the underlying cause of the lesion is known (e.g., stroke, vasculitis, diabetes mellitus, genetic abnormality).
Somatosensory: information about the body per se including visceral organs, rather than information about the external world (e.g., vision, hearing, or olfaction).

The presence of symptoms or signs (e.g., touch-evoked pain) alone does not justify the use of the term neuropathic.

- Central neuropathic pain: pain caused by a lesion or disease of the central somatosensory nervous system.
- Peripheral neuropathic pain: pain caused by a lesion or disease of the peripheral somatosensory nervous system.

Adapted from International Association for the Study of Pain. IASP taxonomy. Internet. Accessed on January 24, 2016.

Published by Roberto Wenk. Reviewed by Alison Ramsey. Last updated date: January 16, 2019.

Neuropathic pain is pain caused by damage or disease affecting the somatosensory nervous system. It may be associated with abnormal sensations called dysesthesia or pain from normally non-painful stimuli (allodynia). It may have continuous and/or episodic (paroxysmal) components. The latter resemble stabbings or electric shocks. Common qualities include burning or coldness, "pins and needles" sensations, numbness and itching.

Central neuropathic pain is found in spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, and some strokes.
Aside from diabetes (diabetic neuropathy) and other metabolic conditions, the common causes of painful peripheral neuropathies are herpes zoster infection, HIV-related neuropathies, nutritional deficiencies, toxins, remote manifestations of malignancies, immune mediated disorders and physical trauma to a nerve trunk.
Neuropathic pain is common in cancer as a direct result of cancer on peripheral nerves (e.g., compression by a tumor), or as a side effect of chemotherapy (chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy), radiation injury, or surgery.

Adapted from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Internet. Accessed on September 25, 2016.

Neuropathic pain

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