Respiratory-Gated Vagal Nerve Stimulation for Chronic Pain
Public ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT04053127. Field values are reproduced from the official study page; the official ClinicalTrials.gov record remains the source of truth for eligibility, enrollment, and contact information.
Data is sourced from official ClinicalTrials.gov public API records. Always review the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for the latest information.
Brief summary
Reproduced verbatim from the official ClinicalTrials.gov record. Not medical advice.
Vagus Nerve Stimulation (VNS) is a validated and FDA-approved therapy that has improved the lives of many individuals with epilepsy and depression and has shown promise for treating chronic pain. However, there is moderate morbidity associated with the surgical procedure and maintenance of VNS. The study team has developed a novel, non-invasive procedure based on the neurobiology of VNS treatment which is termed Respiratory-gated Auricular Vagal Afferent Nerve Stimulation (RAVANS). The investigators hope to maximize efficacy and better understand applicability of RAVANS by applying this to chronic pain patients with a range of psychiatric and psychological comorbidity. This high-distress subpopulation of chronic pain patients has been notoriously difficult to treat and is in need of new, innovative therapies. The investigators propose applying electrical stimulation of the somatosensory vagal afferent receptors in the ear using transcutaneous-VNS (t-VNS) during the exhalation phase of breathing in order to augment the clinical efficacy of t-VNS. This proposal includes a single blinded, controlled design for testing the impact of RAVANS therapy on pain and mood fro chronic pain. Patients will complete 2 in-person visits, one with RAVANS therapy and one with non-RAVANS stimulation. During each session, participants will complete questionnaires, quantitative sensory testing (QST), and receive either real or sham RAVANS stimulation.
Study identification
- NCT ID
- NCT04053127
- Recruitment status
- Completed
- Study type
- Interventional
- Phase
- Not applicable
- Enrollment
- 19 participants
Conditions and interventions
Conditions
Eligibility (public fields only)
- Age range
- 21 Years to 65 Years
- Sex
- All
- Healthy volunteers
- Healthy volunteers not accepted
This page does not interpret eligibility. Detailed inclusion and exclusion criteria are on the official ClinicalTrials.gov record.
Study timeline
- Start date
- Mar 31, 2019
- Primary completion
- Jul 31, 2020
- Completion
- Jul 31, 2020
- Last update posted
- Aug 30, 2022
2019 – 2020
United States locations
- U.S. sites
- 1
- U.S. states
- 1
- U.S. cities
- 1
| Facility | City | State | ZIP | Site status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Robert Edwards | Chestnut Hill | Massachusetts | 02467 | — |
Site contact phone numbers, emails, and investigator names are intentionally not displayed here. Open the official ClinicalTrials.gov record for site contact information.
About this trial record page
- What this page shows
- Public field values for ClinicalTrials.gov record NCT04053127, including study identification, conditions, interventions, eligibility (age, sex, healthy volunteer), timeline, and U.S. site list.
- What this page does not do
- No medical advice, eligibility judgments, treatment recommendations, study quality scoring, or AI-generated medical summaries. No site contact phone numbers, emails, or investigator names.
- Where the data comes from
- Sourced from the official ClinicalTrials.gov public API. The official record is the source of truth.
- Last refresh
- Last update posted Aug 30, 2022 · Synced Sep 3, 2026
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Open the official record
The complete protocol, eligibility criteria, and contact information for NCT04053127 live on ClinicalTrials.gov.