Investigation of cold intolerance and affected activities after peripheral nerve injuries

Cesim, Ö.B., Investigation of Cold Intolerance and Affected Activities After Peripheral Nerve Injuries, Hacettepe University Institute of Health Sciences Occupational Therapy Master's Degree Thesis, Ankara, 2018. The study was designed to determine the activities affected by cold intolerance and to investigate the relationship between cold intolerance and sensory function after peripheral nerve injury. Individuals between 18 and 65 years of age who had peripheral nerve injury during the last year of study and who score 30 or more on the Cold Intolerance Symptom Severity Scale (CISS) were included. CISS scale, Rosen Score (RS) and hot-cold sensory evaluations were performed on 60 subjects (37 women, 23 men) with a mean age of 42.28 ± 13.25. The activities in which individuals have difficulties due to cold intolerance were determined by a semi-structured interview. Peripheral nerve injuries were divided into two groups as nerve cuts (n = 30) and nerve neuropathies (n = 30). The CISS score mean was 51.18 ± 16.69, and the RS mean was 1.35 ± 0.54 in the subjects with peripheral nerve cuts (10 women, 20 men) who were 36.27 ± 11.77 years of age. While 16 (53.3%) of these individuals had a hot-cold sensation, the other 14 (46.7%) did not. CISS mean score was 52.46 ± 16.23 and RS mean was 1.87 ± 0.42 in patients with peripheral neuropathy (27 women, 3 men) with a mean age of 48.30 ± 11.98. All the individuals with nerve neuropathy have a hot-cold sensation. In the whole sample, the most difficult activity due to cold intolerance for women was dishwashing (n = 19) and for men was handwashing (n = 9). There was a significant negative correlation between cold intolerance and sensory function in both peripheral nerve cuts and neuropathies (p<0.05, r: -0.696, -0.378). In our study, it was determined that both nerve injuries had usually difficulty in basic and instrumental activities of daily living due to cold intolerance. We conclude that cold intolerance is related to sensory function and that interventions for sensory functions in cold intolerance treatment may reduce the severity of cold intolerance and and decrease the activity and participation limitations due to cold intolerance in these individuals.