Pregabalin Treatment and Prevention Post-herpetic Neuralgia

Prevention Effect of Pregabalin on Postherpetic Neuralgia: A Multicenter, Randomized, Double-blind, Controlled Trial

Pregabalin is effective on herpetic neuralgia, but whether can prevention post-herpetic neuralgia still need to confirm.

Pregabalin has been recommended as the first-line drug for post-herpetic neuralgia (PHN) therapy currently due to its efficacy and safety. However,there was no valuable report at present on the clinical efficacy of pregabalin for acute and subacute herpetic neuralgia (SHN), expect for a smaller study which included 29 outpatients who had acute zoster pain for a period of 7-1 4 days. And it is not clear whether early application of pregabalin can reduce the incidence of PHN.

Therefore, this study was rational designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of pregabalin in the treatment of herpetic neuralgia，and follow-up to the 8 months, evaluation whether impacting the accidence of PHN.

It is the first time in the international that treating acute herpetic neuralgia (AHN) and SHN with pregabalin as a large sample size clinical trial. The results of this study will be great significance for guiding the clinical medication.

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Pain occurs within 90 days of rash onset
2. Numerical rating scale (NRS) greater than 50 mm

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Patient with nervous system disorders which impair completing the pain diaries
2. Patient with history of illicit drug or alcohol abuse within the last 2 years