TY  - JOUR
A1  - Üçeyler, Nurcan
A1  - Kewenig, Susanne
A1  - Kittel-Schneider, Sarah
A1  - Fallgatter, Andreas J.
A1  - Sommer, Claudia
T1  - Increased cortical activation upon painful stimulation in fibromyalgia syndrome
JF  - BMC Neurology
N2  - Background
Fibromyalgia syndrome (FMS) is a chronic condition characterized by widespread pain and associated symptoms. We investigated cerebral activation in FMS patients by functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS).

Methods
Two stimulation paradigms were applied: a) painful pressure stimulation at the dorsal forearm; b) verbal fluency test (VFT). We prospectively recruited 25 FMS patients, ten patients with unipolar major depression (MD) without pain, and 35 healthy controls. All patients underwent neurological examination and all subjects were investigated with questionnaires (pain, depression, FMS, empathy).

Results
FMS patients had lower pressure pain thresholds than patients with MD and controls (p < 0.001) and reported higher pain intensity (p < 0.001). Upon unilateral pressure pain stimulation fNIRS recordings revealed increased bilateral cortical activation in FMS patients compared to controls (p < 0.05). FMS patients also displayed a stronger contralateral activity over the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex in direct comparison to patients with MD (p < 0.05). While all three groups performed equally well in the VFT, a frontal deficit in cortical activation was only found in patients with depression (p < 0.05). Performance and cortical activation correlated negatively in FMS patients (p < 0.05) and positively in patients with MD (p < 0.05).

Conclusion
Our data give further evidence for altered central nervous processing in patients with FMS and the distinction between FMS and MD.
KW  - fibromyalgia syndrome
KW  - depression
KW  - cortical activation
KW  - pain
KW  - near-infrared spectroscopy
Y1  - 2015
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-125230
VL  - 15
IS  - 210
ER  - 
TY  - JOUR
A1  - Hofmann, Lukas
A1  - Karl, Franziska
A1  - Sommer, Claudia
A1  - Üçeyler, Nurcan
T1  - Affective and cognitive behavior in the alpha-galactosidase A deficient mouse model of Fabry disease
JF  - PLoS ONE
N2  - Fabry disease is an X-linked inherited lysosomal storage disorder with intracellular accumulation of globotriaosylceramide (Gb3) due to α-galactosidase A (α-Gal A) deficiency. Fabry patients frequently report of anxiety, depression, and impaired cognitive function. We characterized affective and cognitive phenotype of male mice with α-Gal A deficiency (Fabry KO) and compared results with those of age-matched male wildtype (WT) littermates. Young (3 months) and old (≥ 18 months) mice were tested in the naïve state and after i.pl. injection of complete Freund`s adjuvant (CFA) as an inflammatory pain model. We used the elevated plus maze (EPM), the light-dark box (LDB) and the open field test (OF) to investigate anxiety-like behavior. The forced swim test (FST) and Morris water maze (MWM) were applied to assess depressive-like and learning behavior. The EPM test revealed no intergroup difference for anxiety-like behavior in naïve young and old Fabry KO mice compared to WT littermates, except for longer time spent in open arms of the EPM for young WT mice compared to young Fabry KO mice (p<0.05). After CFA injection, young Fabry KO mice showed increased anxiety-like behavior compared to young WT littermates (p<0.05) and naïve young Fabry KO mice (p<0.05) in the EPM as reflected by shorter time spent in EPM open arms. There were no relevant differences in the LDB and the OF test, except for longer time spent in the center zone of the OF by young WT mice compared to young Fabry KO mice (p<0.05). Complementary to this, depression-like and learning behavior were not different between genotypes and age-groups, except for the expectedly lower memory performance in older age-groups compared to young mice. Our results indicate that genetic influences on affective and cognitive symptoms in FD may be of subordinate relevance, drawing attention to potential influences of environmental and epigenetic factors.
KW  - cognitive impairment
KW  - mouse models
KW  - depression
KW  - swimming
KW  - learning
KW  - Fabry disease
KW  - genetics
Y1  - 2017
U6  - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-170745
VL  - 12
IS  - 6
ER  -