Placebo neuromodulation effect on fibromyalgia symptoms: a case report
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.33448/rsd-v9i10.8653Keywords:
Fibromyalgia; Transcranial direct current stimulation; Chronic pain; Functionality; Anxiety; Depression; Placebo effect.Abstract
Fibromyalgia is a disease in which drug treatment is still not very effective. An alternative that has shown effectiveness in research with chronic pain is transcranial direct current stimulation. An advantage of studies with this technique is the possibility of using the sham protocol, which does not trigger therapeutic effects. Thus, we sought to evaluate the placebo effect of neuromodulation on the levels of pain, functionality, anxiety and depression in a woman with fibromyalgia. This is a case report of female participant, 29 years old, diagnosed with fibromyalgia 17 months ago. The evaluation instruments were the sociodemographic and clinical questionnaire, the Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire to evaluate the functionality, the Visual Analogue Scale to check the level of pain, the Beck Anxiety Inventory and the Beck Depression Inventory, to assess anxiety and depression symptoms, respectively. The treatment consisted of five consecutive sessions of placebo type stimulation, with placement of the anodic electrode on the left primary motor cortex and cathodic over the right supraorbital region for 20 minutes. The equipment was automatically turned off after 30 seconds, and did not trigger therapeutic effects. After the revaluations, there was a reduction in pain level from 9.5 to 0, improvement in functionality, with reduction of 65.68 to 14.99 in the Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire, and reduction of anxiety and depression levels of 27 to 11 to 25 for 2, respectively. In this sense, it is concluded that the expectation of therapeutic results may lead to clinical improvement in fibromyalgia.
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Copyright (c) 2020 Géssika Araújo Melo; Viviann Alves de Pontes; Eliane Araújo de Oliveira; Suellen Mary Marinho dos Santos Andrade; Nelson Torro
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