Protectors of our nervous system play a role in pain

People with chronic pain (left) have higher levels of a protein linked with inflammation (orange and red) in their brains than people without chronic pain (right), suggesting that the cells that protect the brain may also cause pain.

Marco Loggia, Massachusetts General Hospital

By Ashley Yeager

January 13, 2015 at 7:37 pm

The same cells that safeguard our central nervous system may also play a role in chronic pain. People with persistent lower back pain had more translocator protein, which is linked with inflammation, in their brains than their healthy counterparts, new PET and MRI images show. Translocator protein acts as a marker for how active nerve-protecting glial cells are.

Past studies in animals have shown that glial cells play a role in chronic pain, but evidence in humans has been hard to find. The results of the new study, published January 12 in Brain, may help researchers develop a more objective way to measure pain and better ways to treat it.

For more on pain, read SN‘s feature “Hurt Blocker.”