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Subgroups Isolated in OA Pain Sensitivity

Pain; ePub 2016 Jun 20; Cardoso, Riley, et al

Publish date:: July 4, 2016

There are distinct subgroups, or phenotypes, based on experimental pain sensitivity in community-dwelling older adults with knee osteoarthritis (OA), expanding previous findings of similar cluster characterizations in healthy adults, a recent study found. Researchers evaluated data from 292 individuals with knee OA who participated in the Understanding Pain and Limitations in Osteoarthritic Disease (UPLOAD) study. They found:

• 5 clusters were significantly different across all pain sensitivity index (PSI) variables and were characterized by:

1) low pain sensitivity to pressure pain (n=39),

2) average pain sensitivity across most modalities (n=88),

3) high temporal summation of punctate pain (n=38),

4) high cold pain sensitivity (n=80), and

5) high sensitivity to heat pain and temporal summation of heat pain (n=41).

• Clusters differed significantly by race, gender, somatic reactivity, and catastrophizing.

Citation: Cardosa JS, Riley 3^rd JL, Glover T, et al. Experimental pain phenotyping in community-dwelling individuals with knee osteoarthritis. [Published online ahead of print June 20, 2016]. Pain. doi:10.1097/j.pain.0000000000000625.

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