Muscle Pain: Understanding the Mechanisms

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiii

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2. Introduction

   • Siegfried Mense, Robert D. Gerwin

   Pages 1-15

3. Functional Anatomy of Muscle: Muscle, Nociceptors and Afferent Fibers

   • S. Mense

   Pages 17-48

4. Peripheral Mechanisms of Muscle Pain: Response Behavior of Muscle Nociceptors and Factors Eliciting Local Muscle Pain

   • S. Mense

   Pages 49-103

5. Central Nervous Mechanisms of Muscle Pain: Ascending Pathways, Central Sensitization, and Pain-Modulating Systems

   • S. Mense

   Pages 105-175

6. Referral of Musculoskeletal Pain

   • Thomas Graven-Nielsen, Siegfried Mense

   Pages 177-205

7. Increased Muscle Tone as a Cause of Muscle Pain

   • S. Mense, Alfonse T. Masi

   Pages 207-249

8. Reorganized Motor Control Due to Muscle Pain

   • Thomas Graven-Nielsen, Lars Arendt-Nielsen

   Pages 251-268

9. Back Matter

   Pages 269-317

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This edition of the companion volumes Muscle Pain: Understanding the Mech- isms and Muscle Pain: Diagnosis and Treatment is essential reading for those interested in clinical approaches to acute and chronic pain conditions involving muscle tissues and in the mechanisms underlying these conditions. The volumes cover a very important topic in pain medicine, since muscle pain is very common and can often be dif?cult to diagnose and treat effectively. Furthermore, chronic pain involving muscle and other components of the musculoskeletal system increases with age, such that it is a common complaint of those of us who are middle-aged or older. Indeed, as changing population demographics in “west- nized” countries result in higher proportions of the population living longer and being middle-aged and elderly, chronic muscle pain will likely become even more of a health problem. In the case of acute muscle pain, this can often be very intense, and in the short term can limit or modify the use of components of the musculoskeletal system associated with the sensitive muscle. Chronic muscle pain can also be intense, as well as unpleasant and disabling, and it is in many cases the over-riding symptom of most musculoskeletal disorders that are associated with long-term deleterious changes in musculoskeletal function.

• anatomy
• behavior
• fibromyalgia
• muscle pain
• myofascial low back pain
• myofascial trigger points
• pain mechanisms

• Centrum für Biomedizin und, Medizintechnik Mannheim (CBTM), Universität Heidelberg, Mannheim, Germany

  Siegfried Mense

• Pain & Rehabilitation Medicine, Johns Hopkins University, Bethesda, USA

  Robert D. Gerwin

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