Liste-14

TRANSCRANIAL ELECTROANALGESIA (TEA) AS EFFECTIVE NON-PHARMACEUTICAL METHOD FOR PAIN MANAGEMENT (PM).

Lebedev VP

Purpose: About 15 years ago a new method of TEA was experimentally elaborated by us and introduced in clinical practice for PM. The results of TEA experimental studies and of clinical observations will be reviewed.

Method: Broad screening experiments in different species of animals were done to make a choice of optimal electric parameters and electrode position for TEA. Some quantitative methods for study of TEA intensity (e.g.spectral analysis of pain vocalization) were elaborated. Several modern methods such as neurophysiological, autoradiographic, radioimmunochemical, immunocytochemical, MRI were used to investigate TEA mechanisms and it safety.

Results: Clinical usage of TEA and TEA devices were adapted for chest and abdominal surgery as an analgesic component of anesthesia (high current level - HCL) and for postoperative PM and treatment of different pain syndrom (lower current level - LCL). According to the endorpinergic mechanism of TEA the pain killing effect was observed at 10-15 min after the begining of current application. TEA with HCL elicited the increase of blood beta-endorphin concentration in about 10-15 times, TEA with LCL - in 3-5 times in blood and cerebro-spinal fluid respectively. During anesthesia morphine-like analgesics were exluded, in early postoperative period the analgesic consumption was reduced up to 13% in comparison with control. TEA of LCL was used for treatment (without analgesics) of many thousands patients with pain syndromes of different origin and location by neuropathologists, stomatologists, gastroenterologists, oncologists in about 300 hospitals and ou!