The effects on pain of reconstructive neurosurgery in 160 patients with traction and/or crush injury to the brachial plexus
pp. 126-147
in: Jean Siegfried, Manfred Zimmermann (eds), Phantom and stump pain, Berlin, Springer, 1981Abstract
The excruciating pain experienced following avulsion lesions of the brachial plexus was mentioned by Flaubert [7] in 1827. Drawing from his experience during the American Civil War, Mitchell [16] described the causalgic syndromes associated with nerve injuries of the upper limb and coined the term "phantom limb," about which Ambroise Paré had already written in 1552. At the turn of the century, Duval and Guillain [6] established the fact that the majority of traction lesions of the brachial plexus implied nerve root avulsions from the spinal cord. Many years later, when the Melzack and Wall [13] theories became popular, the hypothesis was ventured that the pain syndrome of brachial plexus lesions could be associated with deafferentation due to avulsion. To date, no precise data are available on this matter in brachial plexus injuries.