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1 Programme in Brain & Behaviour, The Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
2 Centre for Neuroscience and Department of Pharmacology, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: peter.a.smith{at}ualberta.ca.
Neuropathic pain that results from injury to the peripheral or central nervous system, responds poorly to opioid analgesics. Y1 and Y2 receptors for neuropeptide Y (NPY) may however serve as targets for analgesics that retain their effectiveness in neuropathic pain states. In substantia gelatinosa neurons in spinal cord slices from adult rats, we find that NPY acts via presynaptic Y2 receptors to attenuate excitatory postsynaptic currents (EPSCs) and predominantly on presynaptic Y1 receptors to attenuate glycinergic and GABAergic inhibitory postsynaptic currents (IPSCs). Since NPY attenuates the frequency of TTX-resistant miniature EPSCs and IPSCs, perturbation of the neurotransmitter release process contributes to its actions at both excitatory and inhibitory synapses. These effects, which are reminiscent of those produced by analgesic opioids, provide a cellular basis for previously documented spinal analgesic actions mediated via Y1 and Y2 receptors in neuropathic pain paradigms. They also underline the importance of suppression of inhibition in spinal analgesic mechanisms.
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