Health Pain Sufferers Use Brain to Find Relief -- Robert Preidt
MONDAY, Dec. 12 (HealthDay News) -- Viewing their own live brain
images may help people with chronic pain lower their pain levels, say
Stanford University School of Medicine researchers.
Their study
included eight people with chronic pain and 36 healthy people who
viewed their brain images on real-time functional magnetic resonance
imaging (rtfMRI). With training, the participants were able to
influence their pain by controlling activity in one of the brain's pain
centers, the rostral anterior cingulate cortex. They did this using
mental exercises while they viewed their real-time brain activity.
The findings appear in the Dec. 12 online issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"We
believe these subjects and patients really learned to control their
brain and, through that, their pain," study co-author Dr. Sean Mackey,
an assistant professor of anesthesia, said in a prepared statement.
The study participants were given various mental strategies to try to alter their brain activity.
"As
an example, we asked them to think about changing the meaning of pain.
Instead of thinking of it as a terrible experience, to think of it as
something relatively pleasant. Then the patients were turned loose.
Over time, subjects showed an increased ability to change their brain
and by doing so to modulate their pain," Mackey said.
He and his colleagues couldn't say exactly how the study volunteers actually did this.
While
the Stanford researchers are hopeful that this method may have
potential as a long-term treatment for people with chronic pain, they
emphasize that much more research is needed.
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