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Multiple Choice

Which of the following is a site of referred pain listed in the material?

Pain from internal organs can be felt in a different, somatic region because visceral and somatic nerves share the same spinal-level pathways. Afferents from midgut structures like the cecum and ascending colon enter the spinal cord around the T10–T11 level, which corresponds to the periumbilical area of the skin. That convergence leads the brain to interpret the signal as coming from the umbilical region, so referred pain is commonly reported there. This pattern explains why the material lists the cecum and ascending colon as a referred-pain site. Other organs have different referral maps: stomach pain often presents in the epigastric region, and liver-related pain can refer to the right shoulder or upper right back, while sigmoid colon pain tends to be felt in the lower left quadrant.

Pain from internal organs can be felt in a different, somatic region because visceral and somatic nerves share the same spinal-level pathways. Afferents from midgut structures like the cecum and ascending colon enter the spinal cord around the T10–T11 level, which corresponds to the periumbilical area of the skin. That convergence leads the brain to interpret the signal as coming from the umbilical region, so referred pain is commonly reported there.

This pattern explains why the material lists the cecum and ascending colon as a referred-pain site. Other organs have different referral maps: stomach pain often presents in the epigastric region, and liver-related pain can refer to the right shoulder or upper right back, while sigmoid colon pain tends to be felt in the lower left quadrant.