ArticlePain2017
Repeated exposure to sucrose for procedural pain in mouse pups leads to long-term widespread brain alterations.
Article in Pain, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 21 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
21 citing papers in PubMed, 47 citations in OpenAlex.
- Trial
- Repeating a dose of sucrose for heel prick procedure in preterms is not effective in reducing pain: a randomised controlled trial.European journal of pediatrics · 2020Trial
- Pain, Opioids, and Functional Connectivity in Preterm Infants.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Sweet relief or lasting impacts? Review of neonatal pain and sucrose in developing rodents.Pain reports · 2025Article
- PRG-1 Relieves Neonatal Stimuli-Induced Hyperalgesia and Anxiety via Stage-Specific Synapse Remodeling.CNS neuroscience & therapeutics · 2025Article
- Neonatal Sucrose and Internalizing Behaviors at 18 Months in Children Born Very Preterm.JAMA network open · 2025Article
- Cerebellar Development and the Burden of Prematurity.Cerebellum (London, England) · 2025Review
- Neonatal paw pricking alters adolescent behavior in a sex-dependent manner and sucrose partially remediates the effects.Physiology & behavior · 2024Article
- Brain health in preterm infants: importance of early-life pain and analgesia exposure.Pediatric research · 2024Review
- A longitudinal observational study on the epidemiology of painful procedures and sucrose administration in hospitalized preterm neonates.Paediatric & neonatal pain · 2024Article
- Early-life exposure to analgesia and 18-month neurodevelopmental outcomes in very preterm infants.Pediatric research · 2023Article
- Infant pain vs. pain with parental suppression: Immediate and enduring impact on brain, pain and affect.PloS one · 2023Article
- The Effect of Endotracheal Suctioning Using the Four-handed Care on Physiological Criteria and Behavioral Responses of the Preterm Infants: Randomized Crossover Clinical Trial.Journal of caring sciences · 2022Article
- Assessment and Management of Pain in Preterm Infants: A Practice Update.Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
- Cerebellar development after preterm birth.Frontiers in cell and developmental biology · 2022Review
- Sex-specific effects of neonatal oral sucrose treatment on growth and liver choline and glucocorticoid metabolism in adulthood.American journal of physiology. Regulatory, integrative and comparative physiology · 2021Article
- The influence of pain, agitation, and their management on the immature brain.Pediatric research · 2020Review
- Nociception and the neonatal brain.Seminars in fetal & neonatal medicine · 2019Review
- The Energy Costs of Prematurity and the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) Experience.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2018Review
- Adverse Behavioral Changes in Adult Mice Following Neonatal Repeated Exposure to Pain and Sucrose.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 5 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
Oral sucrose is administered routinely to reduce pain of minor procedures in premature infants and is recommended as standard care in international guidelines. No human or animal studies on effects of early repeated sucrose exposure on long-term brain development have been done in the context of pain. We evaluated the effects of repeated neonatal sucrose treatment before an intervention on long-term brain structure in mouse pups. Neonatal C57Bl/6J mice (n = 109) were randomly assigned to one of 2 treatments (vehicle vs sucrose) and one of 3 interventions (handling, touch, or needle-prick). Mice received 10 interventions daily from postnatal day 1 to 6 (P1-6). A dose of vehicle or 24% sucrose was given orally 2 minutes before each intervention. At P85-95, brains were scanned using a multichannel 7.0 T MRI. Volumes of 159 independent brain regions were obtained. Early repetitive sucrose exposure in mice (after correcting for whole brain volume and multiple comparisons) lead to smaller white matter volumes in the corpus callosum, stria terminalis, and fimbria (P < 0.0001). Cortical and subcortical gray matter was also affected by sucrose with smaller volumes of hippocampus and cerebellum (P < 0.0001). These significant changes in adult brain were found irrespective of the type of intervention in the neonatal period. This study provides the first evidence of long-term adverse effects of repetitive sucrose exposure and raises concerns for the use of this standard pain management practice during a period of rapid brain development in very preterm infants.
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.