Brain Damage from Chronic Pain

The Damaging Effects of Chronic Pain on the Brain – Wellescent.com – originally posted 2015

Wellescent.com is a defunct website (2008-2014), but still holds a lot of interesting and useful information.

How Does Chronic Pain Change Behavior?

Now, it is one thing to talk about changes in the brain, but what most of us will find important is how brain changes affect behavior and personality. Previous research has found a number of changes in mental function caused by chronic pain. 

One example is that those suffering from chronic pain have difficulty making even simple decisions and interacting with other people.

This has become a serious and embarrassing problem for me.  

Cerebrovascular Risk from Chronic Pain

Chronic Pain May Increase Cardiac and Cerebrovascular Event Risk – Clinical Pain Advisor – by Kwamesha Joseph – May 2020

Individuals with chronic pain may have an increased risk for major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (MACCEs), according to study results published in Pain Medicine.

Outcomes included

• all-cause mortality,
• stroke,
• a need for coronary angioplasty, and
• occurrence of acute myocardial infarction.

Participants with chronic pain had a higher prevalence of underlying comorbidities such as hypertension, diabetes, renal diseases, and depression.   

Notes from University Course on Pain Management

I found these free materials for an online pain management course from the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and I think they’re quite reasonable.

I would recommend them to anyone that wants a thorough overview of “pain management” or just to see what’s being taught about it/us.

Basic Definitions & Clinical Implications – Pain Management

Making a Distinction Between Pain and Nociception   

Chronic Pain in Brain: Structural and Functional Changes

Chronic Pain: Structural and Functional Changes in Brain Structures and Associated Negative Affective States – free full-text article /PMC6650904/ – Jul 2019

This is an extremely thorough article covering many aspects of chronic pain. I’ve tried to cover only key parts and avoid lengthy descriptions of scientific details. After each section, I show a link to the complete section with all its details.

Abstract

Chronic pain is a condition in which pain progresses from an acute to chronic state and persists beyond the healing process.

Chronic pain impairs function and decreases patients’ quality of life.

In this review, we summarize the results of previous studies, focusing on the mechanisms underlying chronic pain development and the identification of neural areas related to chronic pain.  

Stopping Rx Opioids Associated with Death

Study: Stopping Long-Term Opioid Prescriptions Associated With Veterans’ Deaths – Filter Magazine – By Staff – Mar 2020

For years, pain patient activists have been sounding the alarm about the consequences of abruptly halting people’s access to opioid analgesics…

And we have not just been whining and complaining about our increased “biopsychosocial” pain. The physical and mental impact of experiencing unrelieved, constant, chronic pain can be overwhelming. The danger of forced tapers is an extremely serious and urgent problem, which is increasingly…

…supported by much research.  

Chronic Pain Patients at Higher Risk for Coronavirus

Chronic Pain Patients Are at Higher Risk for Coronavirus – By Lynn Webster, M.D. – Feb 2020

In this article Dr. Webster makes an important point: the ravages of chronic pain affect our susceptibility to other illnesses because our whole bodies, including our immune system, are affected by the constant stress brought about by this constant biological state of high alert.

It might be worthwhile showing this article (link above) to your doctor, including the scientific article explaining the research (link below).

The people with increased risk for experiencing severe symptoms, and possibly dying of COVID-19, are seniors and those with chronic illness.  

Anatomical changes correlated with chronic pain

Anatomical changes correlated with chronic pain in forensic medicine – Free full-text /PMC6197126/ –  Jun 2017

This article from the NIH has a good summary of physical changes that come about due to chronic pain, not just psychological “problems”, but numerous physical harms resulting from unrelieved pain.

This study was performed to determine the relationships between chronic pain and anatomic changes that may occur in the body.Autopsies were performed on fatalities that required death investigation in Linn County, IA, or adjacent and nearby areas.

Certain causes of death may also have been related to chronic pain. The heart, lungs, liver, spleen and kidneys were significantly heavier in persons with chronic pain; emphysema and pleural and abdominal adhesions were more common in persons with chronic pain.  

Sudden, Unexpected Death in Chronic Pain Patients

Sudden, Unexpected Death in Chronic Pain Patients – By Forest Tennant, MD, DrPH – Sep 2012

Sudden, unexpected death may occur in a severe, chronic pain patient, and the terminal event may be unrelated to medical therapeutics. Fortunately, sudden death is not as commonly observed in pain patients as in past years most likely due to better access to at least some treatment. Sudden death still occurs, however, and practitioners need to know how to spot an “at-risk” patient.

For observers, pain is merely a “harmless nuisance”. For those suffering from it, it’s a”physiologic calamity”.

Update: Bodily Harm from Chronic Pain Part 2

Chronic pain, unmedicated and just by itself, causes measurable biological damage affecting our physical and mental health. I wish more people knew this so they’d stop assuming that “pain won’t kill you, but opioids will”.

The opposite is true: Constant pain, in addition to causing physical harm,  impairs and eventually destroys your Quality of Life (see tag “suicide” for more links to chronic pain).

Chronic pain will make you wish for death, but opioids will only kill you if you take much more than prescribed.

So I decided to update the older list/reference page of posts about various kinds of Bodily Damage from Uncontrolled Chronic Pain by starting a second page:

Bodily Damage from Uncontrolled Chronic Pain Part 2  has more recent posts starting September 2017 up to December 2019

(You can also use tag ‘PAIN-DAMAGE‘ to find them all posts on this topic)

Critical link between pain intensity and suicide

VA study uncovers critical link between pain intensity and suicide attempts –  Oct 2019

Here’s the earthshattering conclusion of a new study:

New study finds pain intensity is a telling risk factor for suicide!

Apparently, this is BIG news for the medical community. They’ve never found such results before – probably because no one has studied it.

It saddens me that most people still don’t understand how devastating chronic pain becomes, how it upends lives and sometimes cuts them short.