Research into the role of the brain in chronic pain
These days, academics routinely talk about their work and place pictures of themselves on web sites like bodyinmind.org. However, the picture we choose to show the world may reveal more about the way we see ourselves than we realise. Together with a great cast of researchers from my laboratory at UniSA and Flinders University I collected 5829 … [Read more...]
As we have discussed in part 1 and 2 of this series of posts, there is some evidence that classical conditioned responses play a role in chronic pain (Flor and Birbaumer 1994; Schneider, Palomba et al. 2004; Klinger, Matter et al. 2010). We have discussed the work of Flor and others showing that injury response systems (such as motor and autonomic) … [Read more...]
Lorimer grew a mo. To help promote men's health. It was during this time that he, and his mo, gave a talk at TEDx. Here it is. httpvh://youtu.be/gwd-wLdIHjs … [Read more...]
I’ve got news for those of us who thought that Italians just sat around wearing designer sunglasses and drinking fine coffee; it turns out we were wrong. This fMRI study by a group in Milan is a pearler, and I urge anyone who’s interested to have a look at it.[1]First was a look into empathy: these investigators wanted to know whether … [Read more...]
Our last rubber hand illusion paper attracted this comment from one of the reviewers: ‘it would take something very special to get yet another study on the rubber hand illusion into a journal like this one’. We were pretty sympathetic to the reviewer because there really are a tonne of them out there. Here is one that was actually published a … [Read more...]
I am an optimist but I am thinking about jumping the fence - joining the dark side of pessimism and excessive dread. Maybe I am being a bit hasty? I know we all think that there is little benefit in pessimism and that we would rather have an optimistic patient come in the door than a pessimistic one. There is an entire industry based on pop-psych … [Read more...]
I reckon the rubber hand illusion is a great way to provide hard evidence that the brain produces our sensations according to the availability of credible information, not just according to sensory input from the body. I use the rubber hand illusion to do this, but i think there is a version of the rubber hand illusion that might do it better. I … [Read more...]
Our group has done a few rubber hand illusion experiments, not that we are really serious players in this area – if you want to take part in a rubber hand illusion experiment, start loitering around UCL – it is almost certain someone there will be doing an such an experiment. The brain mechanisms that underpin the rubber hand illusion are … [Read more...]
Some of you may remember that we ran a limerick competition. Well we now have a winner. Alison Klossner, by popular vote, has taken out the very big prize of a few hundred dollars worth of Cynergy Professional education seminars. Alison's limerick captures that intriguing pathophysiological characteristic of people in chronic pain - cortical … [Read more...]
A while back Ben Wand blogged here about grey matter density changes in the brain and chronic pain – and particularly about a study demonstrating grey matter density reductions in patients with arthritic hip pain that reversed to a degree after successful hip replacement surgery.A new study, published in the Journal of Neuroscience by David … [Read more...]
There has been a lot of talk and fuss about the rubber hand illusion, since Botvinick and Cohen first described it.[1] In short, by stroking the real hand, which is out of view, and a fake rubber hand, which is in view, at exactly the same time and in synch, one can induce the illusion that it is the touch on the rubber hand that one really … [Read more...]
The gate control theory gave us all a theoretical rationale for ‘rubbing it better’ – activation of Aβ fibres and subsequent ‘closing of the gate’ in the dorsal horn. Well, there is a new paper just out in Pain,[1] that raises the possibility of another quick and easy analgesic strategy – crossing your arms. My mum reckons that her mum … [Read more...]
BIM invited me to add my “two pennyworth” (two cents worth for the rest of you!) following Lorimer’s series of excellent blogs. Despite his protestation there is no going back……., the end of neurocentricity is nigh!No one interested in the subjects that Lorimer focused on in his blogs, learning, memory and neuroplasticity (the clue is … [Read more...]
I had my annual viewing of Susan Boyle on Britain’s got talent this morning. Then I came across this amazing demonstration of what photoshop can do. Watch that, or watch for a little while and go to the end - it is a bit tedious. We and others have shown that our cognitive representation of our body affects our body - we have shown that … [Read more...]
The integration of negative affect, pain and cognitive control in the cingulate cortex is a recently published review, which raises some interesting ideas [1].The best place to start is with a bit of neuroanatomy...if you were to cut your brain straight down the middle into two hemispheres and check out the medial surface of both hemispheres … [Read more...]
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