Botulinum toxin treatment of neuropathic pain

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Neuropathic pain appears to be an actual medical and social issue. Pharmacological and neurosurgical treatment methods do not always lead to effective pain relief. The aim of this review is to summarize clinical data on the antinociceptive effects and clinical use of BTA in patients with central and peripheral neuropathic pain. We searched for RCTs, systematic reviews, and meta-analyzes on the subject in the PubMed and OvidSP databases from 2008 to February 2020. BTA injections may be beneficial for patients with neuropathic pain, when pharmacotherapy is ineffective, insufficiently effective or cannot be used. Botulinum toxin may be used as a multi-purpose drug for these patients due to its clinical efficacy, favorable safety profile and long-term pain relief effecr after a single injection. At the same time, BTA injections are referred to the third-line drugs and further large-scale, carefully conducted clinical studies are needed to increase the recommendations level for the BTA use in terms of the neuropathic pain treatment.

Keywords:

neuropathic pain

Botulinum toxin type A

neuropathic pain treatment

botulinum toxin for neuropathic pain

neuropathic pain botulinum therapy

Authors:

L.A. Medvedeva

FGBU "RNTsKh im. akad. B.V. Petrovskogo" RAMN

O.I. Zagorulko

Petrovsky Russian Research Center of Surgery

ORCID: 0000-0002-2713-9577

G.E. Shevtsova

Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow

Received:

22.04.2020

Accepted:

29.04.2020

Conflict of Interest :

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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