Higher Cortical Facilitation and Serum BDNF Are Associated with Increased Sensitivity to Heat Pain and Reduced Endogenous Pain Inhibition in Healthy Males.

Background: Although the brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) has been intensively investigated in animal models of chronic pain, its role in human pain processing is less understood.

Objective: To study the neurophysiology of BDNF modulation on acute experimental pain, we performed a cross-sectional study.

Methods: We recruited 20 healthy male volunteers (19-40 years old) and assessed their serum BDNF levels, quantitative sensory testing, and cortical excitability parameters using transcranial magnetic stimulation.

Combined neuromodulatory interventions in acute experimental pain: assessment of melatonin and non-invasive brain stimulation.

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) and melatonin can effectively treat pain. Given their potentially complementary mechanisms of action, their combination could have a synergistic effect. Thus, we tested the hypothesis that compared to the control condition and melatonin alone, tDCS combined with melatonin would have a greater effect on pain modulatory effect, as assessed by quantitative sensory testing (QST) and by the pain level during the Conditioned Pain Modulation (CPM)-task.