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Unraveling Back Pain Chronicity: an EMG and EEG Study

NCT03705676 · Status: COMPLETED · Phase: NA · Type: INTERVENTIONAL · Enrollment: 107

Last updated 2023-12-18

No results posted yet for this study

Summary

This study aims at examining the influence of both threat of experimentally induced pain and clinical low back pain (LBP) on trunk motor control on the one hand and brain activity related to movement preparation on the other hand. Therefore, 3 groups are studied: healthy controls, people with recurrent LBP, and people with chronic LBP. A comparison in electromyography (EMG) of the trunk muscles and electroencephalography (EEG) activity between the 3 groups will be made in 2 conditions: a control condition without experimental pain on 1 test day, and a fear condition with experimental pain on another test day. In both conditions a motor control task will be performed and muscle and brain activity will be measured during each motor control task.

It is hypothesised that motor control will be different between the 3 groups in both conditions, i.e. delayed trunk muscle onset in LBP groups compared with controls. With regards to the brain activity, it is expected that preparation for movement will also be delayed in the LBP groups. Furthermore, it is expected that the fear condition will entail differences in both EMG and EEG within each group.

Conditions

  • Low Back Pain

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Rapid Arm Movements

240 trials of RAM in either a forward (50%) or backward (50%) shoulder flexion direction and back to neutral as fast as possible, with maintaining extension in the elbow. Visual cues (arrows) indicated the movement direction.

DEVICE

Unpleasant stimulus

An unpleasant, but harmless, electrocutaneous stimulus is administered to the low back region in 25% of the threat trials during the fear condition. Due to a conditioning phase before testing, participants know to expect this stimulus after the presentation of a warning cue related to the fear trials (either pink or blue dot dependent on randomization).

DEVICE

Vibrotactile stimulus

In all trials, during the presentation of the warning cue, a vibrotactile stimulus is administered to the low back region. This stimulus is used to evoke somatosensory evoked potentials (SEP) measured with EEG during the movement-preparation phase.

Sponsors & Collaborators

  • University Ghent

    lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

  • Lieven Danneels, PT, PhD · University Ghent

Study Design

Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
SINGLE
Model
CROSSOVER

Eligibility

Min Age
18 Years
Max Age
45 Years
Sex
ALL
Healthy Volunteers
Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start
2017-03-03
Primary Completion
2018-04-17
Completion
2018-04-17

Countries

  • Belgium

Study Locations

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Read the full study record

This page highlights key information. For complete eligibility criteria, study locations, investigator contacts, and the full protocol, visit the original record on ClinicalTrials.gov.

View NCT03705676 on ClinicalTrials.gov