Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0033774 (pruritus)
 14,546 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Previous reports of extensive lipid accumulation within neurons of the autonomic nervous system in Fabry disease suggest an anatomicopathologic basis for the peculiar pain, diminished sweating, and gastrointestinal symptoms experienced in this disorder. To further assess autonomic function in Fabry disease, noninvasive clinical tests were performed on 10 patients. Diminished sweating was found in each; the loss was approximately uniform proximally and distally, suggesting sweat gland dysfunction rather than autonomic neuropathy. Impaired pupillary constriction with pilocarpine, and reduced saliva and tear formation were found in half the patients. Disordered intestinal mobility was demonstrated in the oldest patients. In all cases, the cutaneous flare response to scratch and intradermal histamine was diminished, and pruritus was not experienced. Signs of autonomic dysfunction are present in Fabry disease and correlate with the known lipid deposition in autonomic neurons.
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PMID:Fabry disease: impaired autonomic function. 680 89

Ten healthy males between 18 and 33 years received 10 mg morphine sulfate intravenously, or by lumbar epidural injection at two sessions 2-4 weeks apart, in random sequence. The following observations were made at intervals for 22 h. (1) Segmental hypalgesia to ice and pin scratch. (2) Cold pressor response test in hand and foot as an index of analgesia. (3) Time of onset and duration of side effects. (4) Serum concentrations of morphine. Few non-respiratory changes were seen after intravenous morphine. Cold pressor response was unchanged in hand and foot, no segmental hypalgesia or itching occurred, and only one subject complained of nausea. Marked changes occurred after epidural morphine. Cutaneous hypalgesia to ice and pin scratch appeared in the thoracolumbar region all subjects. In six subjects hypalgesia rose to the midthoracic region during the second or third hour and to the trigeminal distribution between the sixth and ninth hour in five subjects. Cold pressor response fell rapidly in the foot during the first 1.5 h after epidural morphine, and a little later cold pressor response also fell in the hand in all subjects, and remained depressed for the duration of the experimental period. Pruritus occurred at three hours in nine of the 10 subjects, nausea at about four hours in six of the subjects, and vomiting at about six hours in five of the subjects. Hypalgesia and side effects were not related to serum concentrations of morphine. These results suggest that lumbar epidural morphine travels cephalad in the cerebrospinal fluid to reach the brain stem and fourth ventricle by the sixth hour.
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PMID:Rostral spread of epidural morphine. 708 27

Two siblings with progressive intrahepatic cholestasis were reported. The brother died at 4 years of age because of hepatic failure followed by persistent obstructive jaundice starting at 4 months of age. The sister had unique clinical features, including recurrent obstructive jaundice since early infancy, radiopaque gallstone and neurological abnormalities which were cerebellar ataxia, bilateral ptosis, hyporeflexia and visual disturbance involving retinal degeneration and optic atrophy. She had a coarse facial appearance, camptodactyly and sclerotic skin with many scratch marks. Persistent high levels of serum bile acids were found while the patient was icteric and even anicteric, though serum cholesterol levels were approximately within normal limits. The serum lipoprotein-X was negative whenever examined. Cholestyramine treatment gave incomplete relief from pruritus but resulted in no improvement in her clinical course.
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PMID:Familial cholestasis with gallstone, ataxia and visual disturbance. 711 42

Ten healthy young male volunteers received in random sequence 10 mg of morphine sulfate intravenously and by lumbar epidural route during two 26-hour study sessions, in order to observe the appearance and resolution of the following side effects: (a) pruritus, (b) nausea, (c) vomiting, (d) urinary dysfunction. With the exception of one subject, who experienced transient (2 hours) nausea, none of the subjects experienced any adverse side effects after the intravenous morphine. However, all subjects experienced some degree of one or more complications, starting 3 hours after the epidural administration: generalized pruritus started at 3.0 +/- 0.3 hours (nine of 10 subjects, mean +/- SD) and lasted 5.3 +/- 4.0 hours. Nausea occurred in six subjects at 4.0 +/- 0.6 hours, and lasted 3.0 +/- 2.1 hours; vomiting occurred at 6.3 +/- 2.0 hours in five of the nauseated subjects. Urinary retention of varying intensity and duration appeared in nine subjects and required pharmacologic intervention in six subjects. Serum levels of unmodified morphine were measured at various times after administration during both sessions and did not correlate with the incidence or temporal appearance of side effects. Serial evaluation of dermatomal level of hypalgesia to ice and pin scratch demonstrated a progressive spread in the rostral direction after epidural morphine; trigeminal areas were affected by 9 hours in five of the 10 subjects. The stereotyped sequence of side effects after 10 mg of morphine by the epidural route can be interpreted to reflect widespread dispersion of morphine throughout the subarachnoid and ventricular cerebrospinal fluid.
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PMID:Nonrespiratory side effects of epidural morphine. 720 Jul 37

A sensitive electromagnetic movement detector has been developed to estimate itch by measuring scratch during sleep. The cumulative time of nocturnal limb movements of patients with itchy and non-itchy liver diseases was estimated. Non-itchy patients moved their arms for 24 +/- 9.3 min/8 h (mean +/- s.d.) and their legs for 16 +/- 7.0 min/8 h. The limb movements were not related to left or right handedness or the sex or age of the patient. Itchy patients had increased nocturnal limb movements; however, the increase in arm movement (up to five times control level) was much greater than the increase in leg movement (up to twice control level). The marked increase in arm movements in itchy patients supports the view that this movement is largely due to scratching. The reproducibility of the estimates of arm movements was reasonable (within-person coefficient of variation 22%). In three studies, treatment resulted in a reduction of arm movements to normal levels. The measurement of cumulative nocturnal arm movement by these sensitive meters appears to be a valid estimate of scratch and superior to a subjective assessment of itch. The devices may also be applied to other studies, such as the effects of hypnotic drugs on sleep movement and the measurement of vibration.
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PMID:The measurement of itch with sensitive limb movement meters. 742 23

The effect of oral charcoal on idiopathic generalized pruritus in 11 stable patients undergoing maintenance hemodialysis was compared to that of placebo dextrose in a controlled, double-blind, cross-over study. Contrasted to placebo, charcoal, 6 g daily for 8 weeks, relieved pruritus subjectively in all but one patient (P = 0.01). Symptomatic relief from pruritus coincided with objective resolutions of active, scratch-induced skin lesions (P = 0.03). No significant alterations were noted in the serum concentrations of standard laboratory variables, including lipids, alkaline phosphatase, phosphorus, or calcium, during treatment with either charcoal or placebo. No adverse effects from the charcoal were noted during the study.
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PMID:Relief of idiopathic generalized pruritus in dialysis patients treated with activated oral charcoal. 743 64

Limb activity meters, otherwise modified self-winding watches that can record limb agitative movements such as in itch-provoked scratch, were introduced for an objective evaluation of the relative effectiveness of three antipruritic drugs: chlorpheniramine, cyproheptadine, and sulphapyridine for palliating pruritus associated with chloroquine chemosuppressive treatment of acute malarial febrile paroxysms in eighteen adult patients. Six fit and healthy subjects were also studied to obtain data for unmedicated controls. The meters were used to monitor the upper and lower limb activities of the patients during nocturnal sleep for 6 hours over 3 consecutive nights, after they had developed the chloroquine-induced pruritus and were then administered the antipruritic medications, six patients per drug, by a random selection. Sulphapyridine antipruritic treatment significantly reduced the activities of the upper limbs of itchy patients much greater than did cyproheptadine (P < 0.0001, right hand; P < 0.01 left hand). However sulphapyridine-treated patients still itched significantly more than controls from the greater activities in the dominant right hand of the patients (P < 0.05). Cyproheptadine had a marginally-better performance than chlorpheniramine, generally, in palliating the chloroquine-induced pruritus but only in one of 3 nights, for the right hand recordings, were the limb activities significantly different. There was no significant difference observed in the activities of the lower limbs for the unmedicated controls compared to itchy patients, irrespective of the antipruritic treatment mode. Five out of the 6 patients treated with sulphapyridine also complained of anorexia plus a feeling of fullness or indigestion.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)
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PMID:The antipruritic effects of chlorpheniramine, cyproheptadine and sulphapyridine monitored with limb activity meters on chloroquine induced pruritus among patients with malaria. 749 3

The studies described herein characterize animal behavioral models for conjunctival and cutaneous itch. Histamine was used as the reference stimulus for model development because it is firmly established as a pruritogen in both conjunctiva and skin. Itching evokes the desire to scratch in human subjects, so hind limb scratching at the afflicted area was used to identify pruritogenic stimuli. Under optimized environmental conditions, hind limb scratching behavior yielded substantial and highly reproducible responses. The conjunctival itch-scratch response was delineated from pain and foreign body sensations by using appropriate stimuli. Examination of a large and diverse variety of autocoids revealed that only histamine, platelet-activating factor (PAF) and arachidonic acid and its cyclooxygenase metabolite prostaglandin E2 possessed meaningful pruritogenic activity. PAF-induced ocular pruritus did not involve histamine release, according to studies with appropriate antagonists. Thus PAF-induced ocular pruritus was unaffected by the histamine H1-receptor antagonist pyrilamine but was substantially attenuated by the PAF antagonists WEB 2086 and CV-6209 and was virtually abolished by E-6123. Similar itch-scratch behaviors were quantified in hairless guinea pig skin following the application of cowhage or the iontophoretic administration of histamine and PAF. Findings from these newly developed itching models suggest that PAF could be an important mediator of the pruritic sensation by activating a population of nerve endings responsible for encoding the itch sensation.
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PMID:Characterization of a behavioral model for peripherally evoked itch suggests platelet-activating factor as a potent pruritogen. 785 91

1. We used functional positron emission tomography (PET), measuring regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) as an index of neuronal activity, to investigate the central processing of itch in 10 healthy volunteers subjected to intracutaneous injections of histamine. 2. The study has unraveled a central representation that depicts a motor intention of the urge to scratch contingent on the perception of unpleasant itch. The coactivation of the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), supplementary motor area (SMA), premotor area (PM), and inferior parietal lobule (IPL) substantiates that the posterior sector of the ACC (Brodmann 24) is related to the sensorial/affectional aspect of the event. The premotor cortical areas (SMA, PM) and the IPL may participate in the preparation of an intended action.
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PMID:Urge to scratch represented in the human cerebral cortex during itch. 789 5

The purpose of the study was to establish a useful animal model for quantification of itching and to examine whether the wavelengths inducing itching were identical to those inducing erythema. Four groups of hairless mice were irradiated with 4 different light sources in order to provoke itch. The light sources were adjusted to give equal erythrogenic doses. The groups were treated 5 times weekly for a year. For the first 16 weeks the daily dose was 0.6 minimal erythema dose (MED) and for the following 36 weeks 1.2 MED. The severity of the itching in the 4 groups and in a control group of untreated mice was compared. The chosen parameters were the number of scratch-sequences and the summarized time of scratching during an observation period of 1 h. Ultraviolet irradiation provoked itching. Especially the wavelengths 315-330 nm were more itch-provoking than erythemogenic. The difference between the control group and a group treated with Philips TL12 combined with a Tempax filter was significant. An action spectrum of itching does not seem to be identical to the erythema action spectrum. The animal model described is usable to quantify itch but has to be simplified. Of the lamps used, Philips TL01 was the least itch-provoking lamp type and may be preferred in the treatment of itching diseases.
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PMID:Scratching and ultraviolet irradiation: an experimental animal model. 818 99


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