Quantitative sensory testing in patients with polyneuropathy and healthy individuals

AIMS: Elderly individuals and patients with polyneuropathy often feel heat pain or burning sensation on quantitative sensory testing (QST) of warm perception distally in the lower limbs. We therefore studied heat pain threshold (HPT), warm perception threshold (WPT) and the difference between heat pain and warm perception thresholds in 48 patients with symptoms and signs of polyneuropathy matched according to age and gender with 48 healthy persons. METHODS: QST (using method of limits) was performed on the distal calf and the dorsal foot. RESULTS: Particularly in the neuropathy group several individuals (58%) had an unpleasant feeling, often burning, when the thresholds according to the WPT algorithm were recorded. Difference between heat pain and warm perception thresholds in the lower calf of the patients was 3.9 +/- 3.5 and 5.8 +/- 3.4 degrees C in the controls (P = 0.012), and on the foot 3.8 +/- 2.8 vs 5.3 +/- 3.6 degrees C (P = 0.02). CONCLUSIONS: When performing QST it is important to assess also quality features of warm perception, such as burning and heat pain sensation.