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Persistent pain: Trim the branches or fell the tree?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 September 1997

Richard H. Gracely
Affiliation:
Pain and Neurosensory Mechanisms Branch, National Institute of Dental Research, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892 gracely@yoda.nidr.nih.gov

Abstract

In patients with pain characterized by a painful focus and allodynia, the painful symptoms arise from altered central processing that is initiated and subsequently maintained by persistent input from nociceptive afferents. Treatments directed at this normal consequence of persistent input are inherently limited. The most efficacious treatments will target the pathology, the various sources of ongoing nociceptor input. [blumberg et al.; coderre & katz; dickenson]

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
© 1997 Cambridge University Press

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