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The purpose of this study was to identify the clinical characteristics of neuropathic pain in patients with carpal tunnel syndrome. We retrospectively reviewed 143 hands in 127 patients with carpal tunnel syndrome. The neuropathic pain was determined by using the painDETECT as a self-administered psychometric questionnaire to distinguish neuropathic pain. There were no significant differences in the characteristics of the patients with and without neuropathic pain. However, there were significant differences in the pain scores between those with and without neuropathic pain (p < 0.01). Furthermore, there was a significant difference between the existence of night pain in these patients (p < 0.01). Based on the results of the current study, we conclude that it is important to be aware of, and consider the existence of neuropathic pain during the treatment of patients with carpal tunnel syndrome with night pain or a high score on the numerical rating scales of pain.

Background: Night pain has important diagnostic and prognostic values in patients with carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS). We aimed to determine whether night pain is associated with certain patient characteristics in female patients undergoing carpal tunnel release.

Methods: We recruited 75 women with the mean age of 54 years who were scheduled for carpal tunnel release. Diagnosis of CTS was made based on both the clinical symptoms and the results of electrophysiologic studies. Patient characteristics investigated as factors potentially associated with night pain were: age, body mass index (BMI), symptom duration, comorbidities such as diabetes mellitus (DM) and thyroid disease, electrophysiologic severity of CTS, and sleep position. We conducted a logistic regression analysis to examine the relationships between the presence of night pain and the different patients' demographic and clinical variables.

Results: Absence of night pain was associated with increased age (odds ratio (OR), 0.918, 95% confidence interval (CI), 0.851 to 0.99) and presence of DM (OR, 0.196; 95% CI, 0.046 to 0.835). The other variables assessed were not found to be associated with presence or absence of night pain.

Conclusions: This study found that in women undergoing carpal tunnel release, older patients or those having DM are slightly less likely to have night pain. As night pain is an important prognostic factor for CTS, further studies are warranted to determine whether the absence of night pain could affect outcome assessment of CTS in the elderly or patients with DM.