Department of General Internal Medicine and Psychosomatics, University Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany.
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Charité, Campus Mitte, Berlin, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2019 Sep 20;9(1):13667. doi: 10.1038/s41598-019-49403-7.
There has been a surging interest in the putative role of peripheral growth factors in the pathophysiology of fibromyalgia, specifically in the peripheral sensitization that occurs in chronic pain disorders. This cross-sectional study set out to assess and compare brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and nerve growth factor (NGF) in plasma samples from fibromyalgia patients and healthy controls. Plasma BDNF and NGF were measured in 89 fibromyalgia patients and 36 pain-free controls, and compared using ANCOVA controlling for potential confounders, as well as Bayesian methods for parameter estimation and model evaluation. BDNF and NGF levels in fibromyalgia patients did not differ from those in pain-free controls. Statistical methods were consistent, with both frequentist and Bayesian approaches leading to the same conclusions. Our study fails to replicate the finding that peripheral BDNF is altered in fibromyalgia, and instead our findings suggest that plasma levels of growth factor appear normative in fibromyalgia.
人们对外周生长因子在纤维肌痛病理生理学中的潜在作用产生了浓厚的兴趣，特别是在外周敏化在慢性疼痛疾病中发生的情况下。这项横断面研究旨在评估和比较纤维肌痛患者和健康对照组的血浆样本中的脑源性神经营养因子 (BDNF) 和神经生长因子 (NGF)。在 89 名纤维肌痛患者和 36 名无痛对照组中测量了血浆 BDNF 和 NGF，并使用协方差分析控制潜在混杂因素，以及贝叶斯方法进行参数估计和模型评估。纤维肌痛患者的 BDNF 和 NGF 水平与无痛对照组没有差异。统计方法是一致的，无论是频率主义方法还是贝叶斯方法都得出了相同的结论。我们的研究未能复制外周 BDNF 在纤维肌痛中改变的发现，相反，我们的研究结果表明，生长因子的血浆水平在纤维肌痛中似乎是正常的。
