Can You Control Pain With Your Mind?

I’ve always thought so…in fact, that’s the whole basis behind mind-body techniques like self-hypnosis. You get into a deep state of relaxation, go to your “happy place” and give yourself suggestions like, “the pain in my knee (ankle, foot, back, whatever) doesn’t trouble me.” Hey, it’s worked for me. So has meditation and deep breathing. Some use prayer. Some simply ignore their pain and go about their business, bless their stoic hearts.

PNN’s own ProComicDiva had a similar, positive experience with acupressure. When post-surgical back pain made it damned near impossible for her to walk, a friend suggested an acupressurist. With a light touch on a specific spot on her ear, she was – only after a few visits – pain free.

Still, writing off many of these mind-body-spirit techniques as mere placebo analgesia is the “party line” of some in the traditional medical profession. They think that if you strongly believe a particular treatment will offer pain relief, it will…temporarily. But so far no one has been able to explain exactly how.

Now maybe we’re getting closer. Scientists in Germany have concluded that the placebo effect can be measured…not just in the brain, but also in the base of the spinal cord, where sensations of pain are processed. This is also called the “dorsal horn,” where Diva’s acupressurist told her that her pain signals had become “scrambled.”

Dr. Falk Eippert, from the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf, first measured the pain threshold of their subjects (15 healthy young men) by applying heat to their arms. Next, his researchers had the volunteers rub a different cream into each arm. They told the men that one cream is a very effective painkiller, and that the other was not (in reality, both creams were inactive.) After juicing them with more heat, the participants reported that they felt less pain in the arms that had been smeared with the “effective painkiller.”

The researchers then took functional MRI scans of the young men’s spinal cords. They found that when the subjects were told that both arms received the effective cream, the dorsal horn showed less activity compared to when they were told the cream was useless.

Eippert’s team concluded that placebo analgesia works by inhibiting the activity of the body’s pain centers in the central nervous system…and psychological factors could be the trigger.

Take that, you AMA nonbelievers. True, it’s a small sample of a homogenous group. (And why weren’t women tested?) Still, it’s the gold-plated, double-blind evidence that many of us have been looking for, that the placebo effect is NOT simply psychological, but a complex mix of the psychological and the physical.

This could be interesting news in the further study of conditions that are rooted in the central nervous system, like pain and depression (and, possibly, fibromyalgia?)

While Eippert and company weren’t exactly sure what mechanisms tell the spine to tone it down when a placebo is given, they speculate that the body’s natural painkilling substances (like serotonin, and endorphins) could be the factors.

Makes sense to me. From my head all the way down to my dorsal horn.

So what do you think about this new study? Have you tried any mind-body treatments that have helped your pain? Has anything you tried worked for a couple weeks and then stopped?