What is spinothalamic tract?

spinothalamic tract performs feelings of pain, temperature, itching and touch from different parts of the body to thalamus. There are two parts of the spinothalamic tract; Side tract and front tract. The side tract performs feelings to the brain and creates feelings of pain and temperature and the front tract impulses are interpreted as pressure and touch. This is what is known as affective feeling . For example, if you write a pin on the tip of your finger, it feels through a spinothalamic tract and sends a signal to your brain and your brain to withdraw from the source of pain to reduce. If you have itching, the brain will send an impulse to scratch.

The typical path of the pulse performed by a spinothamalic tract begins in the skin, often at ends, such as hands or legs. For example, if it pricks you with a neuron known as psuedudipolar neuron, it connects the skin and the dorsal aspect of the spinal cord. The pulse that comes from the skin passes through these pseudounipolarMi neurons and then reaches a secondary neuron known as the tract cell. These tract cells exceed or decush, anterolateral or frontside spinal cord. From the cells of the spinothalamic tract, it carries the impulse to the spinal cord to the brain stem and to the thalamus, which contains a third -order neurons that carry the pulse to several areas of the brain.

clinically, spinothalamic tract can be involved in the spinal cord injury. Because it decuts at the spine level, it creates different reactions than some other nerve pathways that decorate in the brain. If the spinothalamic tract is injured, a damaged tissue called a lesion can be created. If the lesion is on one side of the spine, there will be a loss of pressure and touch under the lesion on this side. Because the spinothalamic tract path is decoked on the spine and rises on the opposite side of the spinal cord, it results in pain under the lesion, but on the opposite side of the body, which is called dissociated sensory loss.