Previous expectations can influence the amount of pain that people feel. These expectations can be shaped by external clues or by verbal information from clinicians on how treatments could relieve pain. Led by Lauren Atlas, researchers from the National Institute of Health have explored if and how distinct ways to shape expectations differentially influence physically hurtful experiences.
In their Jneurosci Document, the researchers present their results of 40 healthy volunteers who evaluated how painful thermal stimulation they followed during the neuroimagery scans. Participants learned external clues for pain, which varied from one test to another. For some trials, participants also received a placebo “treatment” lotion. The external indices attenuated pain for all participants, but only half of the participants said they were less injured with the introduction of placebo treatment. Researchers also found that predictive signals had less impact when patients also received placebo treatment. The combined effects of clues and treatment have been linked to activity in several separate brain regions. There were distinct neural associations with the effects of external signals alone or placebo lotion alone; Only external clues affected a brain biomarker for pain and treatment of treatment influenced evaluative brain areas. Thus, expectations shaped by external indices or information on treatments can have different mechanisms to influence pain.
According to researchers, this work suggests that benchmarks based on benchmarks have more consistent effects than treatment -based expectations, that clinicians may need to keep in mind.
If a doctor says, “It will hurt”, it’s a signal. When a doctor explains: “This treatment will relieve your pain”, it is a different type of waiting. Doctors may need to know that the way they inform patients will have different impacts about the amount of pain they feel. »»
Lauren Atlas, researcher, National Institute of Health
