Originally published January 10 2006
Stanford study aims to teach people how to manage chronic pain
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Sean Mackey, MD, PhD, a Stanford assistant professor of anesthesia, conducted research that found a way to use MRI imaging to enhance people's ability to endure chronic pain.
There may be a high-tech way to teach people to handle chronic pain, scientists report.
They're not talking about a sophisticated device that erases pain.
Instead, they used medical technology to help patients learn how to handle their own pain.
The strategy is in its early days, so it's not ready for widespread use.
Thorough tests are needed, the researchers note.
They describe their work in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The study included 36 healthy students from Stanford University and 12 people in their 30s with chronic pain.
The pain patients had largely had little relief from other pain treatments (including painkillers and counseling).
Those who didn't have chronic pain received pain exposure through heat applied to the palm of their left hand during the experiment.
First, everyone got four written rules about coping with pain.
Next, participants were told they would get real-time brain scans using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) while they used those rules to cope with pain.
For comparison, four pain patients were taught another way to deal with their pain, without getting any brain scans.
That method involved biofeedback, in which people learn to consciously control automatic body processes through watching monitors of their body functions such as heart rate and respiration.
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