NIH-funded study suggests brain is hard-wired for chronic pain

NIH-funded study suggests brain is hard-wired for chronic pain
Certain people's brains appear hard-wired for chronic pain, according to new research from Northwestern University. In a study published in the journal Pain, the researchers showed that chronic pain sufferers had distinctly different brains than those whose injury pain didn't turn chronic. About 1/4 of pain cases occur in the lower back, and about 1/4 of these become chronic. Researchers used to think that there was something different about the injury or the back itself that made some people more vulnerable. But the new study shows that the differences may be in the brain. Scans that looked at the brain's white matter (pictured, green lines) found areas with distinct differences in structure (red dots) in chronic pain patients. What's more, these scans can predict who will develop chronic pain after an injury about 80% of the time. Scientists are now trying to understand the neural networks that help control chronic pain.

Read more about this:
 http://www.ninds.nih.gov/news_and_events/news_articles/pressrelease_brain_chronic_pain_09172013.htm
Journal article: "Brain white matter structural properties predict transition to chronic pain" Pain, 2013. DOI: 10.1016/j.pain.2013.06.044
Image credit: Courtesy of Apkarian lab, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine.