It is the first time that a sex-related difference in pain signaling has been identified in human spinal cord tissue.
It has been known for a long time that women and men experience pain differently, but most of the research on the subject used rodents, mainly males. A new study, published in the journal BRAIN, has used female and male spinal cord tissue from rats, but (for the first time) also from humans, donated by deceased people and their families, and concludes that spinal cord neurons signal pain differently in women than in men.
What is responsible for this seems to be a protein involved in neuronal growth called BDNF, which could amplify pain signals from the spinal cord in males, but not in females. Everything points to a hormonal connection, because when the female rats had their ovaries removed, the difference in pain processing disappeared.
The person responsible for spinal cord neurons signaling pain differently in women and men seems to be a protein involved in neuronal growth, called BDNF. Everything points to one hormonal cause.
Ovarian inhibition of BDNF protein leads to pain relief.
The absence of ovaries allows
the painful action of the BDNF protein.
The person responsible for spinal cord neurons signaling pain differently in women and men seems to be a protein involved in neuronal growth, called BDNF. Everything points to one hormonal cause.
Ovarian inhibition of BDNF protein leads to pain relief.
The absence of ovaries allows
the painful action of the BDNF protein.
This is the first time that a sex-related difference in pain signaling has been identified in human spinal cord tissue, and although future studies are required to understand how this biological difference may contribute to differences in pain sensation. between men and women, “the discovery lays the foundation for the development of new, better and more personalized treatments to help those who suffer from chronic pain,” says Annemarie Dedek, lead author of the study.
“The creation of new analgesics requires a detailed understanding of how pain is processed at a biological level,” adds the researcher, especially in the face of the opioid epidemic in which the United States is immersed. The data allows us to observe the seriousness of the matter: “Between 1999 and 2019, almost 500,000 people have died from an overdose related to an opioid, either illegal or prescribed by a doctor,” according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2019 alone, about 136 people died each day from an opioid overdose, accounting for more than 70% of drug overdose deaths. In other words, it was as if a medium-sized plane had crashed every day in that country.
In Spain, chronic pain – a disease suffered above all by women – affects one in six people (17%), about eight million, according to the Ministry of Health. Of these, 11% (almost a million), have mobility problems or limitations in their daily lives for this reason.
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