Home Based Brain-Train Treatment of Central Neuropathic Pain Following Spinal Cord Injury

Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) affects a person's ability to move and feel sensation from the body. SCI is also an indirect cause of a persistent pain, called Central Neuropathic Pain (CNP). This pain typically develops several months after the injury.

In 30% to 40% of SCI patients, severe CNP affects their everyday living including sleep and mood. Medical treatment of CNP is moderately effective and costly, both to the patient and to the health care system.

In a previous study, some characteristic 'signatures' of brain waves that are related to CNP were defined. Based on this, a novel treatment for CNP based on neurofeedback was developed and clinically tested on five SCI patients. Electroencephalograph (EEG) was used to record patients' brain waves and shown to patients on a computer screen in a simple graphical form (e.g. bars). Patients were trained to change their brain activity at will and, as a consequence, their pain was reduced. Costly laboratory devices were used and once the study was over, an adequate alternative could not be offered to patients.

In this study, a cheap, portable, wireless and user friendly, Conformité Européenne (CE) marked EEG device will be used to train 10 patients to self-administer the therapy in the comfort of their homes. Participants will be given initial training to use the equipment then will be asked to use the system at home for 3 months - initially, 3-5 times a week then, if/when pain subsides, at least once a week or as required.

The primary purpose of the study is to determine whether a portable system for neuromodulation is a useful tool for administering therapy for pain (intensity of pain will be measured by the visual numerical scale (VNS)).