Researchers placed a total of 64 patients with musculoskeletal pain syndromes in the lumbosacral area into two age groups: 30 to 50 years (41 patients) and 51 to 60 years (23 patients), according to an abstract published on www.pubmed.gov.
The reference group consisted of 20 healthy volunteers comparable in terms of gender, age and level of education. The patients underwent neurological, neuro-orthopedic, clinical-pathopsychological and neuropsychological investigations, the abstract noted.
Among the results:
- Complaints of difficulty with mental concentration were present in 17.3 percent of patients, and problems with remembering information in 20.2 percent of patients.
- As compared with healthy subjects, both groups of patients had cognitive functions in younger patients were affected by the sensory-discriminant (intensity) and affective-motivational (negative emotions, particularly anxiety) characteristics of pain.
- Cognitive functions in older patients were affected by the affective-motivational (anxiety, level of psychoemotional distress) and cognitive (level of catastrophization) components of pain.
"Characteristics of Cognitive Functions in Patients with Chronic Spinal Pain" ran in the journal Neuroscience and Behavioral Physiology in December 2010. It was conducted by researchers at Department of Nervous Diseases, Therapeutic Faculty, I. M. Sechenov Moscow Medical Academy, Moscow, Russia.