Research Analyzes Pain Threshold

Studies have shown that women suffermore chronically painful conditions thanmen, are better able to discriminate pain,and have lower thresholds to experimentalpain stimuli. The current study, reportedin The Journal of Pain (September2004), evaluated the responses of 157oral surgery patients (99 women) toexperimental pain stimuli and clinicallyinduced acute inflammatory pain.

The results found that the femalepatients exhibited greater responses toexperimentally induced pain. Yet, therewere no differences shown for clinicalpain related to gender or ethnicity. Theresearchers concluded that future investigationsof pain responses should factor inthe participants' gender and ethnicity andthe type of pain-inducing stimuli used.