PAINKILLERS that target chronic pain without disrupting the body鈥檚 ability to
react to other stimuli have come a step closer.
John Wood of University College London and his colleagues bred mice whose
pain-sensing nerves lacked sodium channels, which are thought to be vital for
transmitting pain messages.
鈥淭hey showed the desired response to acute pain: they will jump off a hot
plate,鈥� says Wood, 鈥渂ut they don鈥檛 react normally to mechanical or chronic
pain.鈥� Drugs targeting this pathway should block acute pain without interfering
with responses to other stimuli, Wood told the 9th World Congress on Pain in
Vienna last month.
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