Genomics for chronic overlapping pain conditions, 2026, Wainberg et al

Nightsong

Nightsong

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Genomics for chronic overlapping pain conditions​


A wave of large genetic studies show that chronic pain conditions — long managed as separate, organ-specific and often unexplained disorders — share genetic risk concentrated in the nervous system. These findings give the concept of nociplastic pain a firmer biological footing and argue for studying and managing these conditions together rather than in specialty silos.

Link (Nature Reviews Genetics, November 2026)
 
Sean said:
Not sure that having a neurologically modulated component necessarily means nociplastic.
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According to the credible Wikipedia definition it probably does at least for some categories, including ME/CFS:

Nociplastic pain is chronic pain that arises from altered pain signaling within the central nervous system, occurring without clear evidence of tissue or nerve damage.

That would not fit with endometriosis though.

Frances Williams is an intelligent scientist and someone worth interacting with. She has clearly picked up on the ME/CFS link, which is good to see.
 
Jonathan Edwards said:
Nociplastic pain is chronic pain that arises from altered pain signaling within the central nervous system, occurring without clear evidence of tissue or nerve damage.
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What is «altered pain signalling», though?

The occuring part seems to refer to just experiencing pain without clear evidence of tissue or nerve damage triggering peripheral signals into the CNS that under normal circumstances eventually get interpreted as pain somewhere in the brain.

So is the altered signalling referring to something in the brain interpreting normal signals from the rest of the body as pain, or is it that normal stimuli still results in peripheral nerves sending signals equating pain? Or that normal signals from peripheral nerves gets amplified or modulated along the way in the CNS before it gets to the pain-bits of the brain?

If all three fit the bill, it’s not exactly a very homogenous group.
 
Seems far more likely that this would replace the nociplastic concept, which is pretty much the same thing as central sensitization and is just a turtles-all-the-way-down concept. The nociplastic stuff has been completely tainted by psychosomatics, and although it might carry on a dual purpose, it's irreconcilable with the popular models.

Comparing, for example, with some genetic conditions that make some people feel no pain at all, it's not "nociplastic" at all, and anyway the term itself doesn't have a fixed meaning, just some vague "stuff happens here".
 
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