A photo of Christopher King.

Christopher D. King, PhD

  • Assistant Professor, UC Department of Pediatrics

About

Biography

Dr. King has contributed to science by looking at psychological and group-level (i.e., subgrouping of patients) factors underlying analgesic responses to opioid analgesics in healthy adults, opioid regulation of conditioned pain modulation (CPM), and ethnic differences in experimental pain sensitivity, clinical pain, and pain-related disability in patients with knee osteoarthritis (OA). CPM is used to look at the modulatory capacity in humans. It is reduce in chronic pain and older age. Reduction of CPM may contribute to pain and alter somatosensory processing and autonomic regulation. As part of the OA study, Dr. King also examined predictors of knee pain prospectively. Lastly, Dr. King has been involved in several independent studies exploring possible stress-related markers associated with cold pain, which is used as the conditioning stimulus in CPM. He has shown that pain induces the release of endocrine and immune markers, and that they can influence pain responsiveness in pain-free subjects.

Dr. King recently finished a study with naltrexone, an opioid antagonist, on pain modulation, which revealed an interesting interaction between the ability to inhibit pain through endogenous opioids and psychological functioning in pain-free subjects. The recent studies are a first step in a process to evaluate physiological responses induced by pain.

PhD: University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, 2006.

Interests

Pain; stress; inflammation

Research Areas

Anesthesia, Imaging

Publications

Selected

Preliminary evidence for conserved transcriptional response to adversity in adults with temporomandibular disorder. King, CD; Boggero, IA; Schulert, GS; Pickerill, HM; Cole, S. PAIN Reports. 2021; 6.

Processing of pain by the developing brain: evidence of differences between adolescent and adult females. Tong, H; Maloney, TC; Payne, MF; King, CD; Ting, TV; Kashikar-Zuck, S; Coghill, RC; López-Solà, M. Pain. 2022; 163:1777-1789.

Effect of percutaneous electrical nerve field stimulation on mechanosensitivity, sleep, and psychological comorbidities in adolescents with functional abdominal pain disorders. Santucci, NR; King, C; El-Chammas, KI; Wongteerasut, A; Damrongmanee, A; Graham, K; Fei, L; Sahay, R; Jones, C; Cunningham, NR; et al. Neurogastroenterology and Motility. 2022; 34.

Augmented Pain-Evoked Primary Sensorimotor Cortex Activation in Adolescent Girls with Juvenile Fibromyalgia. Tong, H; Maloney, T; Payne, M; Suñol, M; King, C; Ting, T; Kashikar-Zuck, S; Coghill, R; López-Solà, M. 2022.

Characterizing Fatigue Subtypes in Adolescents with Chronic Musculoskeletal Pain and Pain-Free Controls. Boggero, I; Valrie, C; King, C; Morgan, K; Hagiwara, N; Kashikar-Zuck, S. Journal of Pain Research. 2022; 15:2041-2049.

Signature for Pain Recovery IN Teens (SPRINT): protocol for a multisite prospective signature study in chronic musculoskeletal pain. Simons, L; Moayedi, M; Coghill, RC; Stinson, J; Angst, MS; Aghaeepour, N; Gaudilliere, B; King, CD; López-Solà, M; Hoeppli, ME; et al. BMJ Open. 2022; 12.

New insight into the neural mechanisms of migraine in adolescents: Relationships with sleep. Nahman-Averbuch, H; Schneider, VJ; Lee, GR; Peugh, JL; Hershey, AD; Powers, SW; de Zambotti, M; Coghill, RC; King, CD. Headache. 2022; 62:668-680.

Diagnostic criteria for temporomandibular disorders in children and adolescents: An international Delphi study-Part 2-Development of Axis II. Rongo, R; Ekberg, EC; Nilsson, IM; Al-Khotani, A; Alstergren, P; Rodrigues Conti, PC; Durham, J; Goulet, JP; Hirsch, C; Kalaykova, SI; et al. Journal of Oral Rehabilitation. 2022; 49:541-552.

Fatigue in Adults with Chronic Arthralgia/Myalgia in the Temporomandibular Region: Associations with Poor Sleep Quality, Depression, Pain Intensity, and Future Pain Interference. Boggero, IA; Pickerill, HM; King, CD. Journal of Oral and Facial Pain and Headache. 2022; 36:155-163.

Prevalence of somatic and pain complaints and associations with sleep disturbance in adolescents with insomnia presenting to a behavioral sleep medicine clinic. Van Dyk, TR; Krietsch, KN; King, CD; Byars, KC. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine. 2022; 18:151-160.