Maternal separation as a risk factor for aggravation of neuropathic pain in later life in mice.

In this study, we sought to determine whether infant maternal separation (MS) contributes to aggravation of neuropathic pain in adult mice. MS increased anxiety- and depression-like behavioral responses to adult stress. In MS animals, chronic constriction injury (CCI) heightened the sensory dimension of chronic pain relative to that of control mice. However, MS mice treated with fluoxetine for 4 weeks after MS did not exhibit augmentation of allodynia, and their emotional response was attenuated. Microglia were more abundant in the spinal cord in MS/CCI mice than in control/CCI mice. These results suggest that emotional impairment is related to augmentation of neuropathic pain, and that dysfunction of microglial activation contributes to heightened pain sensitivity. PMID: 29935275 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]
Source: Behavioural Brain Research - Category: Neurology Authors: Tags: Behav Brain Res Source Type: research