Clinical pain is associated with shifts in muscle activity location
A review found that people with clinical pain differed from symptom-free controls in where muscle activity was concentrated.
Based on the published abstract. The full paper may contain additional methods, results and limitations.
The 30-second takeaway
The pooled evidence linked clinical pain to a different location of concentrated muscle activity, including among people with chronic low back pain. This association does not show that pain caused the difference or that changing muscle activity would improve symptoms. Limited data prevented pooling the experimental-pain studies.
This abstract-based account cannot establish assessment timing or evidence-certainty ratings, which the abstract does not give. Experimental-pain evidence was too limited to pool.
What researchers found
Difference in activity location
Clinical pain versus symptom-free controls: standardized mean difference, 95% confidence interval 0.15 to 1.84. This compares the activity-location measure in standard-deviation units, not anatomical distance or pain severity. Assessment timing was not reported.
What was measured
The review used high-density surface electromyography to assess where muscle activity was concentrated. Its endpoint was the center of electrical activity, rather than pain relief or improved function.
An unanswered question
Existing clinical pain and experimentally induced pain were both considered. Only clinical-pain results could be pooled, so the abstract leaves the question about experimentally induced pain unresolved.
The original publication
Effect of experimental and clinical pain on the spatial distribution of muscle activity: a systematic review and meta-analysis.
Mendez-Rebolledo G, Orozco-Chavez I, Salazar-Méndez J et al.
Front Hum Neurosci · 2025
- PubMed ID
- 40708809
- Record checked
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