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Biomedical subjects

Russell Portenoy

Publications and source records attributed to Russell Portenoy.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

Development and testing of a neuropathic pain screening questionnaire: ID Pain.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a patient-completed screening tool to help differentiate nociceptive and neuropathic pain. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS: A multicenter study was performed for item reduction (initial 89-item questionnaire) and model building. Patients (N = 586) with non-headache chronic pain completed the questionnaire and were referred to pain specialists for diagnosis. Factor and regression analyses were used to derive a final, 6-item questionnaire--ID Pain. A second multicenter study evaluated reliability and validity. Patients (N = 308) treated by pain specialists completed ID Pain and validation measures. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Sensitivity and specificity were assessed using receiver operating characteristic curves and the concordance c index. Reliability was assessed using a kappa statistic and intraclass correlation coefficient. RESULTS: Final 6 items were: did the pain feel: (1) like pins and needles? (2) hot/burning? (3) numb? (4) like electrical shocks? (5) is the pain made worse with the touch of clothing or bed sheets? (6) is the pain limited to your joints? "Yes" answers to questions 1-5 were scored as 1, while a "yes" answer to question 6 was scored as -1. "No" answers were scored as 0. Higher scores (-1 to 5) suggested a neuropathic component. The questionnaire accurately predicted diagnoses of neuropathic pain made by pain specialists. The concordance c indices in the studies were 0.73 and 0.69. The ICC was 0.742; the kappa statistic ranged from 0.742 to 0.527. CONCLUSIONS: ID Pain appeared to accurately indicate the presence of a neuropathic component of pain. As a brief, self-administered screening tool, it could be useful in primary care settings.

Adult↗

Relief of painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy with pregabalin: a randomized, placebo-controlled trial.

UNLABELLED: This was a 6-week, randomized, double-blind, multicenter study evaluating the efficacy of pregabalin in the treatment of painful diabetic neuropathy. Two hundred forty-six men and women with painful diabetic neuropathy received pregabalin (150 or 600 mg/day by mouth) or placebo. The primary efficacy variable was mean pain score at the end of treatment. Efficacy results indicate that pregabalin 600 mg/day significantly decreased mean pain score to 4.3 (vs 5.6 for placebo, P = .0002) and increased the proportion of patients who had a > or =50% decrease from baseline pain (39% vs 15% for placebo, P = .002). Pregabalin also significantly reduced sleep interference, past week and present pain intensity, sensory and affective pain scores, and bodily pain and decreased by > or =50% the number of patients describing their pain as gnawing, sickening, fearful, and punishing-cruel. More patients receiving pregabalin 600 mg/day than placebo showed improvement, as rated on the Clinical and Patient Global Impression of Change scales, 73% vs 45% and 85% vs 47%, respectively. Pregabalin 150 mg/day was essentially no different from placebo. Dizziness was the most common side effect. These study results show pregabalin 600 mg/day to be safe and effective in reducing the pain and other associated symptoms of painful diabetic neuropathy. PERSPECTIVE: Painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy is a challenging neuropathic pain syndrome. This randomized controlled trial demonstrates that pregabalin, a new drug that interacts with the alpha2-delta protein subunit of the voltage-gated calcium channel, is an efficacious and safe treatment for the pain of this condition.

Aged↗

Relative analgesic potency of fentanyl and sufentanil during intermediate-term infusions in patients after long-term opioid treatment for chronic pain.

Sufentanil, a potent mu-opioid agonist, historically has not been been given systemically to treat chronic pain. An implantable, fixed-rate osmotic pump that delivers sufentanil subcutaneously is being developed for this purpose. In that transdermal fentanyl may be a useful intermediary to estimate the appropriate sufentanil dose before implant, accurate information is needed about the relative analgesic potency of sufentanil and fentanyl during continuous infusion. To determine this relative potency, we administered these drugs to opioid-treated chronic pain patients using a target-controlled infusion (TCI). Sixty-three patients with stable chronic pain and daily oral opioid requirements equivalent to 100-1000 mg of morphine received TCI of fentanyl and sufentanil, each for a minimum of 16 h. Drug administration was double-blind and the order of administration was randomly assigned. Target concentration was changed until the patient reported that analgesia was adequate (defined as a pain level equal to or better than baseline). Seven patients did not complete the infusion and protocol violations invalidated data for 15 patients. For the remaining 41 patients, target concentrations associated with adequate analgesia were achieved for both sufentanil and fentanyl. The median value for the equianalgesic concentration ratio (steady-state fentanyl infusion to steady-state sufentanil infusion) was 7.5; mean potency ratio was 7.44 (95% confidence interval 6.8-8.2). During titrated, intermediate-term infusions in patients previously treated with opioids for chronic pain, sufentanil is approximately 7.5 times as potent as fentanyl.

Adult↗

Clinical analgesic assay of repeated and single doses of heroin and hydromorphone.

A direct comparison of the analgesic activities of heroin and hydromorphone was carried out in cancer patients with postsurgical pain. Intramuscular doses of 5 and 10 mg of heroin were compared with 1 and 2 mg of hydromorphone in a randomized, double-blind, 4-point parallel group assay. Design innovations in the study provided that about half the patients would receive prior repeated doses of the same drug as the test medication, and half would receive the alternate medication. Both test drugs were found to be potent, relatively short acting analgesics with similar profiles of action. Hydromorphone was about 5 times as potent as heroin on a milligram basis. The comparison of those patients who had repeated doses of the same treatment prior to the test dose and those who had repeated doses of the alternate drug demonstrated no significant effect on the relative potency estimates. Side effect occurrence was similar for both drugs, with sleepiness the most prominent effect. The study supports the view that hydromorphone and heroin produce similar clinical effects, and that either drug may adequately substitute for the other. Covariate analysis indicated that time since last analgesic was positively related to analgesia, and amount of prior opioid had a negative relationship. To a lesser extent, increase in patient age was associated with an increase in analgesic scores. Taking these covariates into account served to increase the sensitivity of the analysis.

Affect↗