Iron Deposit- The Potential Pathogenesis in Central Post-Stroke Pain? - Abstract
Background and Purpose: The etiology of central post-stroke pain (CPSP) is poorly understood and such pains are often refractory to therapy. To explore the pathophysiology of such pain in thalamic hemorrhage, we compared 2 patients with CPSP to 1 without CPSP by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).
Methods: We experienced 2 patients, who, following hemorrhage of thalamic region, suffered from an insufferable and inexpressible pain, this was accompanied with hemi-anaesthesia. A year later, MRI has been used to compare with another 1 similar cases without CPSP after thalamic hemorrhage.
Results: MRI showed that low signal intensity on T2-weighted images near to thalamic region in CPSP, while high intensity displayed in similar position without CPSP.
Conclusions: we speculate iron (ferritin or hemosiderin) may take part in the theories of central pain generation.