Chronic Osteoporotic Pain in Mice: Cutaneous and Deep Musculoskeletal Pain Are Partially Independent of Bone Resorption and Differentially Sensitive to Pharmacological Interventions

Figure 6

Efficacy of acute pregabalin treatment on chronic osteoporosis-related cutaneous and musculoskeletal pain and physical function. The effects of acute intraperitoneal pregabalin (100 mg/kg) injections were measured for several hours in mice, 6 months following ovariectomies or sham surgeries. Pregabalin significantly reverses cutaneous plantar hypersensitivity to mechanical stimuli (von Frey assay) (a) and cold (acetone test) (b) and cold plate (c) tests and to heat (radiant heat paw withdrawal assay) (d) in OVX, but not sham-operated, mice. Pregabalin had no effect on OVX-operated mice compared to saline but did result in a trend towards decreased grip strength in sham-operated mice (e). No effects were observed in the open field assay (f). Data are expressed as means ± standard error of the mean. OVX: ovariectomized; ; ; ; and OVX group with pregabalin versus vehicle, two-way repeated measures analysis of variance (factors = group time), followed by Tukey’s test for multiple comparisons.

(a) Mechanical: von Frey

(b) Cold: acetone

(c) Cold plate

(d) Heat: paw withdrawal

(e) Grip strength

(f) Open field