2025-05-212025-05-212025-05-22Oliva Pascual-Vaca, Á., Navarro-Carmona, I., Oliva Pascual-Vaca, J., Riquelme, I., Luque Romero, L.G. y López Millán, J.M. (2025). Idiopathic Neck Pain or Neck Pain of Gastric Origin? A Systematic Review of Rat Experimental Studies on Gastric Harm Pathophysiology and Therapy. International Journal of Clinical Practice, 2025 (5), ID 8835586. https://doi.org/10.1155/ijcp/8835586.1742-1241https://hdl.handle.net/11441/173051Background: Most cases of neck pain are classified as nonspecific or idiopathic pain and show characteristics such as sensitization, hyperalgesia, limited range of motion, and muscle spasm. Visceral disorders can trigger all those features, and gastric disorders are related to neck pain. Furthermore, stress and anxiety are frequently somaticized as neck pain. However, its pathophysiological link has never been determined. Objectives: To identify the electromyographic and postural response to experimental gastric insult in rats. Methods: A systematic review was undertaken. Searches were conducted in the PubMed and Web of Science databases. The date of publication was not limited. References from included articles were assessed. The sample, experimental intervention, and the results were retrieved from each study. Results: Sixteen studies were included. Acromiotrapezius muscle showed the highest activity to gastric damage, being up to 8–10 times higher than abdominal muscles contraction. Also, a postural response compatible with neck muscles spasm was observed. The threshold for reaching cervical spasm was lowered by the addition of stress, gastritis, dyspepsia, ulcers, diabetes, or inflammation of the colon. Increased visceromotor response persisted even more than 60 days after gastric insult, despite no obvious injury was already visible in the stomach. Furthermore, prenatal or neonatal gastric injury also produced gastric hypersensitivity and increased trapezius spasm in adult rats. On the contrary, neck spasm was reduced by reversing diabetes or blocking the gastric receptors and its afferent pathways. Conclusions: Gastric harm triggers neck muscles spasm. Since many gastric conditions and hypersensitivity are common and tend to be chronic, this may contribute to explain the persistence of neck pain and sensitization in many patients. Prenatal and neonatal gastrointestinal suffering increases trapezius visceromotor response in adults. Furthermore, our findings might contribute to explain why stress is frequently somaticized as neck pain.application/pdf14 p.engAttribution 4.0 Internationalhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/AnxietyDiabetesElectromyographyFunctional dyspepsiaNeck painPeptic ulcerPsychological stressStomachinfo:eu-repo/semantics/articleinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccesshttps://doi.org/10.1155/ijcp/8835586