Transcranial Stimulation (tDCS) For the Treatment of Neuropathic Facial Pain

Stopped early · Phase 2 · Has a placebo group

Conditions studied: Facial Pain

In brief

A study to determine if transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS, the device that regulates brain activity, can improve pain in people with neuropathic facial pain and compare which modality (inhibitory tDCS over the somatosensory cortex or excitatory tDCS over the motor cortex) can result in better pain-relief.)

Key facts

Study ID

NCT01849796

Run by

Beth Israel Medical Center

People needed

21

Starts

2010-10-01

Expected to finish

2013-12-01

Last updated by the study team

2015-12-10

Who can join

Age: 21 and older. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: accepted.

You may qualify if…

• Spontaneous facial neuropathic pain due to any of following:
• Trigeminal neuralgia, type 1, (TN1): facial pain of spontaneous onset with predominantly episodic pain.
• Trigeminal neuralgia, type 2, (TN2): facial pain of spontaneous onset with predominantly constant pain.
• Trigeminal neuropathic pain, (TNP): facial pain resulting from unintentional injury to the trigeminal system from facial trauma, oral surgery, ear, nose and throat (ENT) surgery, root injury from posterior fossa or skull base surgery, stroke, etc.
• Trigeminal deafferentation pain, (TDP): facial pain in a region of trigeminal numbness resulting from intentional injury to the trigeminal system from neurectomy, gangliolysis, rhizotomy, nucleotomy, tractotomy, or other denervating procedures.
• Symptomatic trigeminal neuralgia, (STN): facial pain resulting from multiple sclerosis.
• e) Postherpetic neuralgia, (PHN): facial pain resulting from trigeminal Herpes zoster (shingles) outbreak in the trigeminal distribution.
• Pain intensity score for "worst pain in the last 24 hours" >4 on a numeric scale 0-10 at the time of enrollment and before the first stimulation of each treatment block.
• Pain intensity score for "pain right now" >4 on a numeric scale 0-10 before the first stimulation of each block of treatment.

You may not qualify if…

• Uncontrolled hypertension, uncontrolled diabetes, uncontrolled cardiovascular disease
• Other painful conditions than neuropathic facial pain, that are not related to and can't be distinguished from the neuropathic facial pain
• Pregnancy
• Implanted neurostimulation devices (e.g. a spinal cord stimulator, a deep brain stimulator, etc)
• Active illegal drug/alcohol abuse
• Unable to follow directions or complete tools in English.

Where it is running

• Beth Israel Medical Center — New York, New York, United States

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

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