PainOnline - Table of Central Pain Components

Spatial summation is included in the table from very limited data, but it has been reported to apply to all the dysesthetic aspects of Central Pain.

N/A means "not applicable". One example would be that spontaneous dysesthetic burning does not display spatial summation, since the areas of spontaneous burning are fixed in Central Pain and by definition constitute the baseline, constant areas of burning in Central Pain. Application of stimulus would load this definition since spontaneous pain means pain without evident stimuli. It might be tempting to conclude that evoked pain is merely the spatial summation of spontaneous pain, but since evoked pain is a clinical term, and spatial summation is a research term, the context is different and the definitions are not necessarily parallel. This illustrates why tables of Central Pain symptoms such as this one are somewhat transitory until there is a joining of laboratory research and patient complaints.

See the Glossary for definitions of Central Pain terminology.

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Copyright © 2001 by David Berg

Table of Central Pain Qualities	Spatial Summation	Distal Increase	Proximal Increase	Slow Summation	Delay With Overshoot	Durable	Decreased Discriminative Information	Dysesthetic	Relieved by Deep Pressure
Spontaneous Burning	N/A	YES	NO	YES	NO	YES	YES	YES	NO
Evoked Burning	YES	YES	NO	YES	NO	YES	YES	YES	NO
Isotonic Pain	N/A	NO	NO	NO	NO	Cramp	NO	YES	YES
Isometric Pain	N/A	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	YES	N/A
Hyperpathia	unknown	NO	YES	NO	YES	NO	NO	NO	NO
Lancinating	possibly	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	sometimes
Allodynia	YES	YES	NO	YES	NO	YES	YES	YES	NO
Visceral	unknown	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	YES	NO
Circulatory (Pins and Needles)	No	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO