Multimodal Neurophysiology

The spinothalamic system transmits noxious and innocuous thermal and noxious mechanical information. While the assessment of thermo-nociceptive pathways using contact heat evoked potentials (CHEPs) is well established in diagnosis of incomplete spinal cord lesions, objective readouts for pinprick evoked pain (pinprick evoked potentials / PEPs) and cold evoked potentials (CEPs) are more novel.

Neurophysiological techniques are crucial in the early diagnosis of nerve conduction impairments. Here we want to investigate if multimodal neurophysiology improves the clinical diagnosis of myelopathy often presented high variability and subtle clinical presentations. In addition, we aim to assess the integrity of the spinothalamic tract by examining sub-modality specificity of various evoked brain potentials and quantitative sensory testing.

Figure 1: Multimodal neurophysiology to assess the integrity of the spinothalamic tract and the dorsal column. Our multimodal neurophysiological test battery comprises somatosensory evoked potentials (non-noxious electrical stimuli), contact heat evoked potentials (heat stimuli), cold evoked potentials (innocuous cold stimuli) and pinprick evoked potentials (mechanical stimuli).

For further information please contact: Dr. Michèle Hubli