Painless Detection of Painful Neuropathies

Filed in archive Developments , Research on December 7, 2007

Neuropathy is a painful nerve condition that affects millions of people with diabetes (diabetes neuropathy) and other patients too!




Now, scientists at University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC) (in collaboration with scientists from Lucid Technologies in Rochester in N.Y.) have demonstrated a new painless technique for detecting neuropathies.

The painless technique focuses on tiny structures in the skin known as Meissner corpuscles, which encapsulate the endings of microscopic nerves in our hands, feet, and other areas. When someone tickles your feet, or lightly brushes the palm of your hand, or gives you a kiss - it's Meissner corpuscles that are detecting the touch. The tiny structures act like little sensors, allowing us to feel light touch and pressure.

...demonstrated a new way to monitor the structures, which offer a direct window into a condition known as peripheral neuropathy. The team showed that reflectance confocal microscopy, a technology for looking just beneath the surface of the skin, can be used to see and count the number of the structures in a person's fingers and hands. The work gives doctors a non-invasive way to detect and monitor the progression of nerve damage in patients.

What is the current standard procedure for detecting neuropathies, you may ask?

Doctors have known that the number and density of Meissner corpuscles in a person's hands and feet offer a snapshot into the degree of a patient's nerve damage. As nerves degenerate and die, the corpuscles disappear. The difficulty has been actually visualizing and counting them.

Currently, doctors take a small biopsy of the skin, freeze and stain the tissue, and then count the structures. Neurologist David Herrmann, MBBCh, the lead author of the Neurology paper, helped develop and popularize skin biopsy about 10 years ago as a way to keep close track of the condition of nerves in patients. At the time, for some forms of peripheral neuropathy, it was a big improvement over previous methods, which required a much larger biopsy of a large nerve.

Even if it just a small piece of skin that taken for the current procedure - can still be painful to some patients.

The above research finding appears in the December 4 issue of the journal Neurology.

Find more details from URMC.

[Hat tip to Tom Rickey,Senior Science Editor,University of Rochester Medical Center]