Musculoskeletal pain is a clinical condition that is characterized by ongoing pain and discomfort in the deep tissues such as muscle, bones, ligaments, nerves, and tendons. In the last decades, it was subject to extensive research due to its high prevalence. Still, a quantitative description of the electrical brain activity during musculoskeletal pain is lacking. This study aimed to characterize intracranial current source density (CSD) estimations during sustained deep-tissue experimental pain. Twenty-three healthy volunteers received three types of tonic stimuli for three minutes each: computer-controlled cuff pressure (1) below pain threshold (sustained deep-tissue no-pain, SDTnP), (2) above pain threshold (sustained deep-tissue pain, SDTP) and (3) vibrotactile stimulation (VT). The CSD in response to these stimuli was calculated in seven regions of interest (ROIs) likely involved in pain processing: contralateral anterior cingulate cortex, contralateral primary somatosensory cortex, bilateral anterior insula, contralateral dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, posterior parietal cortex and contralateral premotor cortex. Results showed that participants exhibited an overall increase in spectral power during SDTP in all seven ROIs compared to both SDTnP and VT, likely reflecting the differences in the salience of these stimuli. Moreover, we observed a difference is CSD due to the type of stimulus, likely reflecting somatosensory discrimination of stimulus intensity. These results describe the different contributions of neural oscillations within these brain regions in the processing of sustained deep-tissue pain.

肌肉骨骼疼痛是一种临床疾病，其特征是深层组织（如肌肉，骨骼，韧带，神经和肌腱）持续疼痛和不适。在过去的几十年中，由于其流行程度很高，因此受到了广泛的研究。仍然缺乏对肌肉骨骼疼痛期间脑电活动的定量描述。这项研究旨在表征持续的深部组织实验性疼痛期间颅内电流源密度（CSD）的估计。23名健康志愿者分别接受三种类型的三分钟的强直刺激：计算机控制的袖带压力（1）低于疼痛阈值（持续的深层组织无痛，SDTnP），（2）高于疼痛阈值（持续的深层组织）疼痛（SDTP）和（3）触觉刺激（VT）。在可能涉及疼痛处理的七个感兴趣区域（ROI）中计算了响应这些刺激的CSD：对侧前扣带回皮层，对侧初级体感皮层，双侧前岛鞘，对侧背侧前额叶皮层，后顶叶皮质和对侧运动前皮层。结果表明，与SDTnP和VT相比，参与者在所有七个ROI中的SDTP频谱功率总体上都有增加，这可能反映了这些刺激的显着性差异。此外，我们观察到，由于刺激类型不同，CSD有所不同，这很可能反映了刺激强度的体感识别。