New Study Shows Chronic Pain is Real After all...

[drusso]

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Has Science Cracked the Code on Chronic Pain?

In a first, researchers have identified chronic pain pathways in individuals directly from their neural activity, showing promising paths forward for treatment.

www.ucsf.edu

If I were Deyo, Chou, anyone who ever published an article in the Back Letter, or therapeutic nihilists/pain deniers, I'd be pissed...

 

[wendalltwolf]

Great, now I can’t tell them it’s all subjective

 

[Ducttape]

um, not sure how you reach that conclusion.

neuroplasticity was officially termed back in 1948.

my Textbook of Pain by Wall and Melzack discussed neurologic changes - first edition but mine is 3rd ed 1994. some stuff on page 209-11 (just looked it up).

and functional MRI studies, that i think you were so against, did discuss changes seen in pain.
Brain imaging of pain: state of the art


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One reason chronic pain is so difficult to characterize is because the experience of pain is highly complex. It is tied not only to the somatosensory cortex, where the brain receives and processes sensory information, such as touch and temperature, but also to cognitive and emotional processing sectors of the brain. It is deeply entwined with expectation and reward circuits, as well as those related to mood and attention, all of which are constantly fluctuating based on input, environment, and individual biology.