The Brain Is Harmed By Chronic Pain

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The Brain Is Harmed By Chronic Pain

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/96328.php

People with unrelenting pain don't only suffer from the non-stop

sensation of throbbing pain. They also have trouble sleeping, are

often depressed, anxious and even have difficulty making simple

decisions.

In a new study, investigators at Northwestern University's Feinberg

School of Medicine have identified a clue that may explain how

suffering long-term pain could trigger these other pain-related

symptoms.

Researchers found that in a healthy brain all the regions exist in a

state of equilibrium. When one region is active, the others quiet

down. But in people with chronic pain, a front region of the cortex

mostly associated with emotion " never shuts up, " said Dante Chialvo,

lead author and associate research professor of physiology at the

Feinberg School. " The areas that are affected fail to deactivate when

they should. "

They are stuck on full throttle, wearing out neurons and altering

their connections to each other.

This is the first demonstration of brain disturbances in chronic pain

patients not directly related to the sensation of pain. The study

will be published Feb. 6 in The Journal of Neuroscience.

Chialvo and colleagues used functional magnetic resonance imaging

(fMRI) to scan the brains of people with chronic low back pain and a

group of pain-free volunteers while both groups were tracking a

moving bar on a computer screen. The study showed the pain sufferers

performed the task well but " at the expense of using their brain

differently than the pain-free group, " Chialvo said.

When certain parts of the cortex were activated in the pain-free

group, some others were deactivated, maintaining a cooperative

equilibrium between the regions. This equilibrium also is known as

the resting state network of the brain. In the chronic pain group,

however, one of the nodes of this network did not quiet down as it

did in the pain-free subjects.

This constant firing of neurons in these regions of the brain could

cause permanent damage, Chialvo said. " We know when neurons fire too

much they may change their connections with other neurons and or even

die because they can't sustain high activity for so long, " he

explained.

'If you are a chronic pain patient, you have pain 24 hours a day,

seven days a week, every minute of your life, " Chialvo said. " That

permanent perception of pain in your brain makes these areas in your

brain continuously active. This continuous dysfunction in the

equilibrium of the brain can change the wiring forever and could hurt

the brain. "

Chialvo hypothesized the subsequent changes in wiring " may make it

harder for you to make a decision or be in a good mood to get up in

the morning. It could be that pain produces depression and the other

reported abnormalities because it disturbs the balance of the brain

as a whole. "

He said his findings show it is essential to study new approaches to

treat patients not just to control their pain but also to evaluate

and prevent the dysfunction that may be generated in the brain by the

chronic pain.