The Protective Effects of Pre- and Post-Administration of Micronized Palmitoylethanolamide Formulation on Postoperative Pain in Rats

Siracusa R, Fusco R, Cordaro M, Peritore AF, D'Amico R, Gugliandolo E, Crupi R, Genovese T, Evangelista M, Di Paola R, Cuzzocrea S, Impellizzeri D. Int J Mol Sci. 2020 Oct 18;21(20):7700.

Laboratory studyOther animals

Design

Laboratory study

Subjects

Rats subjected to surgical hind paw incision, randomised into groups

Dose used in the study

Micronised PEA (PEA-m), 10 mg/kg oral, given at different time points before or after incision

Duration

Not stated in the abstract

What was measured

Mast cell activation at the incision site; spinal cord nerve growth factor, spinal phospho-ERK, Iba1, GFAP, BDNF and NF-kappa-B pathway activity, after PEA-m given orally at 10 mg/kg before and/or after paw incision.

What the authors reported

Pre- and post-treatment with PEA-m reduced mast cell activation at the incision site and nerve growth factor expression in the lumbar spinal cord. At spinal level it also reduced phospho-ERK, Iba1 and GFAP activation, BDNF expression and the NF-kappa-B pathway. Pre- plus post-treatment worked better than post-treatment alone.

Limits of this study

A rat model of surgical pain; it cannot show effect in people. Salvatore Cuzzocrea is a co-inventor on PEA-related patents held with Epitech Group, described as unrelated to this study.

Source

PubMed 33080989 · doi:10.3390/ijms21207700

Entry checked against the abstract on PubMed on 2026-10-19. The dose shown is the dose the researchers used. It is not a recommendation. How to read this page.