Projektbeschreibung
Neues und effektives Verfahren zur Schmerzlinderung
Schmerz ist ein lebenswichtiges Warnsignal, das darauf hinweist, dass etwas nicht stimmen könnte. Mehr als 10 % der Erwachsenen leiden unter chronischen oder anhaltenden Schmerzen, die trotz Arzneimitteln und Behandlung nicht gelindert werden können. Das EU-finanzierte Projekt PainPersist schlägt einen völlig neuen Ansatz vor und führt experimentelle Studien zur Frühentwicklung von Dauerschmerzen durch. Es entwickelt psychologische Interventionen, die im Rahmen von Langzeitstudien auf negative Erwartungen, die Kontrolle sowie die Belohnung ausgerichtet sind. Ausgehend von modernen neurobiologischen Methoden wie MRT untersucht PainPersist die Mechanismen von Behandlungen, welche der Entwicklung von Dauerschmerzen vorbeugen könnten. Es wird ein innovatives Produkt für die Schmerzuntersuchung entwickelt, um Benutzerinnen und Benutzern eine wahrnehmbare Schmerzkontrolle und Schmerzlinderung zu ermöglichen.
Ziel
Persistent or chronic pain is a key medical and societal problem. In the last decades, biomedical research has undertaken enormous efforts to develop treatments for persistent pain, but the results have been disappointing. This project proposes a radical shift, namely to target the early development of pain persistence and to investigate psychological interventions directed at negative expectations, control and reward in experimental long-term pain studies. A methodological work package will develop novel tools, such as MR spectroscopy of the spinal cord, to track metabolic changes related to persistent pain, and to identify the mechanisms of the proposed interventions. All studies are guided by an integrative model outlining how psychological factors, such as negative expectations and loss of control, can affect the development of pain persistence, and more importantly, how to counteract this process. We will, for example, augment the perception of pain decreases by expectations or use reward manipulations to reinstantiate the effectiveness of the pain modulatory system. Finally, the model proposes that the inability to control pain leads to a state of helplessness. Consequently, the role of helplessness will be investigated and we will test interventions with the goal to allow subjects to regain control over their pain. This will be possible, through the development of a novel pain assessment device, which can be used to detect spontaneous pain decreases and prompt the subject to perform an action (i.e. self-administer a putative treatment). Through the illusion of control, subjects perceive that their action is causal for the pain relief, even though it is actually pain reductions that trigger their action. In the future, this will also allow treatment of patients in which pain is already persistent, and allow them to regain perceived control over, and hence reduce, their pain.
Wissenschaftliches Gebiet
Schlüsselbegriffe
Programm/Programme
Thema/Themen
Finanzierungsplan
ERC-ADG - Advanced GrantGastgebende Einrichtung
20251 Hamburg
Deutschland