Sensory transduction mechanisms in chronic pain

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Pain normally protects us from damaging ourselves or warns us of an injury so that we protect the injured part of the body. In these cases, the pain ceases when the harmful stimulus has gone or the injury has healed. However, in some people the pain is persistent, is no longer associated with injury and has no beneficial protective effect. This chronic pain is associated with some cancers and inflammatory diseases such as arthritis, and can occur after viral infection of the nerves that normally sense pain or after nerve damage associated with diabetes. It is estimated that 300 million people in the world suffer from chronic pain. The current pain killing drugs are mostly based on aspirin or are opiates. The aspirin-like drugs have the drawbacks that they can cause stomach bleeding and are ineffective against nerve injury pain. Apart from concerns about addiction, the opiate like drugs cause sedation, severe constipation and may even stop the patient breathing. The only other types of drugs used to treat nerve injury pain ? anticonvulsant drugs ? also have pronounced undesirable side effects, such as severe dizziness. So there is a large need for new pain killing drugs.