ABSTRACT
Anticonvulsants are useful for trigeminal neuralgia, postherpetic neuralgia, diabetic neuropathy, as well as central pain. Gabapentin is a popular anticonvulsant for neuropathic pain. Gabapentin was approved for use in the United States in 1993, as an adjunctive treatment of adults with partial epilepsy. Gabapentin may be used as monotherapy or add-on/adjunctive treatment. Other possible adverse reactions include confusion, dizziness, and possible weight gain. Adverse effects that occurred more commonly in the gabapentin group included somnolence, dizziness, ataxia, peripheral edema, and infection. Gabapentin is effective in reducing painful dysesthesias and improving quality-of-life scores in patients with painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy. Gabapentin reduces spinally mediated hyperalgesia seen after sustained nociceptive afferent input caused by peripheral tissue injury. Gabapentin also enhances spinal morphine analgesia in the rat tail-flick test, a laboratory model of nociceptive pain. Gabapentin appears to act primarily in the Common central nervous system, in contrast to amitriptyline, which seems to act centrally and peripherally.
