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| Studies of dental pain in men and women offer scientists an opportunity to assess gender influences on the pain experience. Christine Miaskowski, R.N., Ph.D., professor of nursing at the University of California, San Francisco, California (UCSF), described how extraction of third molars, sometimes called wisdom teeth, affects men and women differently. |
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In a series of studies conducted at UCSF's schools of dentistry and nursing, the same oral surgeon performed standardized surgery. Miaskowski and her colleagues then evaluated the effectiveness of several pain-relieving medications on post-surgical pain. They found that certain medications at most doses eased pain in women better and longer than they did in men. |
Some medications ease pain better in women |
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The medications, all available only by prescription, belong to a family of pain-relieving medications known as kappa opioids. They include pentazocine, nalbuphine, and butorphanol. Further research is in progress, Miaskowski said, to discover why men and women respond differently. The researchers also plan to explore the impact of the menstrual cycle on pain sensitivity and medication effectiveness in women. In another dental study, Jocelyne Feine, D.D.S., H.D.R., associate professor, Faculty of Dentistry, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada, followed 27 women and 21 men for 10 days after surgery to implant a replacement tooth. The women described the surgery as significantly more painful than the men did, Feine said, although both sexes rated the pain on a pain scale as similarly intense. In both sexes, pain fell by 50% within two days. In the 10 days following the surgery, women tolerated low levels of pain much better than did the men. As time passed, the men were more disturbed than the women by persisting discomfort. "Women may be 'better sports' about pain," Feine said, "than men are."
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