Pain Induced by Intensive Light Beam Pulse Stimulation of Acupuncture Point GB34 of Lower Extremities and its Associated Changes in EEG's

Abstract

Pain perception and its EEG wave have been used to describe the body's neural systemic response with respect to a given stimulation. Pain artificially induced by non-coherent intensive light (wavelength of 500nm-1200nm) impulse has not been studied yet. In this study this technique was applied to statistically correlate the brain activity under induced pain while particular acupuncture points (yanlingchuan of both feet, GB34) were stimulated by intensive light impulses. The brain electrophysiological signals or electroencephalogram (EEG) at F_p1, F_p2 were recorded. The data of brain waves showed a distinguishable raising slope in this study. Intensive light beam impulse with beam diameter of 10 mm and intensity of 14 joule/cm² was applied to the acupuncture points. In order to quantify the pain effects, a pain intensity function was defined based on the induced pain activities related to the collected data. The pain intensity function and its equations were used to analyze the changing rate of pain with respect to stimulated intensity and pain momentum transport activity. The results showed that the area of the brain wave evoked by pain could be used as pain perception indicator. The raising slope at one brain side was relatively higher when the acupuncture point GB34 at the contralateral side was stimulated.