ArticleFrontiers in neurology2017
Effects of Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation, Transcranial Pulsed Current Stimulation, and Their Combination on Brain Oscillations in Patients with Chronic Visceral Pain: A Pilot Crossover Randomized Controlled Study.
Article in Frontiers in neurology, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 14 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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.
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Who cites it
14 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 24 citations in OpenAlex.
- Neural correlates of N-back task performance and proposal for corresponding neuromodulation targets in psychiatric and neurodevelopmental disorders.Psychiatry and clinical neurosciences · 2022Pooled it
- Reduction of intra-abdominal pain through transcranial direct current stimulation: A systematic review.Medicine · 2019Pooled it
- Transcranial electrical and magnetic stimulation (tES and TMS) for addiction medicine: A consensus paper on the present state of the science and the road ahead.Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews · 2019Pooled it
- Trial
- Investigating the Effects of Anodal Transcranial Pulsed Current Stimulation at Low Frequencies (0.5 to 5 Hz) on Corticospinal and Corticocortical Excitability.Psychophysiology · 2025Trial
- Trial
- Distinct resting state neural activity in chronic pain patients who respond to transcranial electric stimulation for pain relief.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2025Article
- Time since onset might be of essence: A recommendation to assess the effects of combination of non-pharmacological neuromodulatory approaches at early stage since symptoms onset.Frontiers in neurology · 2023Article
- In search of a composite biomarker for chronic pain by way of EEG and machine learning: where do we currently stand?Frontiers in neuroscience · 2023Review
- Transcranial Pulsed-Current Stimulation versus Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation in Patients with Disorders of Consciousness: A Pilot, Sham-Controlled Cross-Over Double-Blind Study.Brain sciences · 2022Article
- Network Mapping of Connectivity Alterations in Disorder of Consciousness: Towards Targeted Neuromodulation.Journal of clinical medicine · 2020Article
- A safety study of 500 μA cathodal transcranial direct current stimulation in rat.BMC neuroscience · 2019Article
- Cortical Plasticity Induced by Anodal Transcranial Pulsed Current Stimulation Investigated by Combining Two-Photon Imaging and Electrophysiological Recording.Frontiers in cellular neuroscience · 2019Article
- Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation as a Therapeutic Tool for Chronic Pain.The journal of ECT · 2018Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 5 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveChronic visceral pain (CVP) syndromes are persistently painful disorders with a remarkable lack of effective treatment options. This study aimed at evaluating the effects of different neuromodulation techniques in patients with CVP on cortical activity, through electreocephalography (EEG) and on pain perception, through clinical tests.
designA pilot crossover randomized controlled study. SETTINGS: Out-patient. SUBJECTS: Adults with CVP (>3 months).
methodsParticipants received four interventions in a randomized order: (1) transcranial pulsed current stimulation (tPCS) and active transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) combined, (2) tPCS alone, (3) tDCS alone, and (4) sham condition. Resting state quantitative electroencephalography (qEEG) and pain assessments were performed before and after each intervention. Results were compared with a cohort of 47 healthy controls.
resultsWe enrolled six patients with CVP for a total of 21 visits completed. Compared with healthy participants, patients with CVP showed altered cortical activity characterized by increased power in theta, alpha and beta bands, and a significant reduction in the alpha/beta ratio. Regarding tES, the combination of tDCS with tPCS had no effect on power in any of the bandwidths, nor brain regions. Comparing tPCS with tDCS alone, we found that tPCS induced higher increase in power within the theta and alpha bandwidths.
conclusionThis study confirms that patients with CVP present abnormal EEG-indexed cortical activity compared with healthy controls. Moreover, we showed that combining two types of neurostimulation techniques had no effect, whereas the two interventions, when applied individually, have different neural signatures.
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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.