Florey Neuroscience Institutes, University of Melbourne, Parkville, Victoria, Australia.
Pain Med. 2012 Apr;13 Suppl 2:S37-43. doi: 10.1111/j.1526-4637.2011.01287.x.
This review summarizes the scientific literature addressing the effects of aging on pain processing in the brain.
A literature search was undertaken using PubMed and search terms including pain, aging, and brain.
Studies including healthy older people and older people with painful disorders were reviewed.
Publications reporting the outcomes of neuroimaging techniques including positron emission tomography, structural and functional magnetic resonance imaging, and electroencephalography in samples incorporating older people were reviewed.
Age-related decreases in regional brain volume occur in structures implicated in pain processing, and are most pronounced in the prefrontal cortex and hippocampus, whereas age-related atrophy in brainstem regions involved in pain modulation is less pronounced. Functional brain imaging has revealed decreased pain activation in the putamen and insula among older people during extrinsic stimuli, but any effects of aging on the processing of clinical pain are yet to be reported.
The network of brain regions involved in pain processing are subject to age-related changes in structure, but that the functional implications of these changes are yet to be determined.
本综述总结了有关大脑中疼痛处理的衰老影响的科学文献。
使用 PubMed 进行文献检索，并使用包括疼痛、衰老和大脑在内的搜索词。
综述了包括健康老年人和患有疼痛障碍的老年人在内的研究。
综述了报告包括正电子发射断层扫描、结构和功能磁共振成像以及脑电图在内的神经影像学技术结果的出版物，这些技术样本中包含了老年人。
与年龄相关的大脑区域体积减少发生在与疼痛处理相关的结构中，在前额叶皮层和海马体中最为明显，而涉及疼痛调节的脑干区域的与年龄相关的萎缩则不太明显。功能性脑成像显示，老年人在外部刺激期间，纹状体和脑岛的疼痛激活减少，但尚未报告衰老对临床疼痛处理的任何影响。
参与疼痛处理的大脑区域网络受到结构上与年龄相关的变化的影响，但这些变化的功能影响尚待确定。
