UK Scientists Find Key To Unlocking Painless Human Life

UK Scientists Find Key To Unlocking Painless Human Life - Using genetically modified mice, researchers at the University College London, U.K. say they’ve found the “secret” to painless human life.

In 2005, billionaire TV host Oprah Winfrey met a five year old kid who was born with an extremely rare genetic mutation. Gabby is unlike any other. She has painless life, meaning, she feels no physical pain.

When Gabby was a baby, her parents found that she chewed her own fingers and mutilated three. Gabby’s parents also had decided to pull her teeth because she was chewing on her tongue (see the Oprah video below this article).

Her condition is called congenital insensitivity to pain, and Gabby is just one of few humans who have the painless life - but apparently, it’s a deadly human mutation. Human pain is important because it protects us from harm. For instance, we know something is wrong inside our body when we feel pain, like stomach pain or headache. 

In short, pain is like the brain’s warning signal that protects us from deadly “stuff” like burn, bites, and so on.

But some people, like cancer patients, need anti-pain medications so scientists have been making “recipes” to unlock the so-called “painless life.”

Now, UCL scientists say they’ve found the recipe for painlessness. Published in the journal Nature on Friday, the scientific article reveals that researchers have recreated the effects of congenital insensitivity to pain in their laboratories. Senior researcher Professor John Wood of UCL says after a decade of research and testing, they’ve found that “Nav1.7 really is a key element in human pain.”

Nav.17 is a sodium-ion ‘channel’ found in nerve cells called nociceptors, and the human body is using these channels to transmit pain signals to the spinal cord and brain.

Using genetically-modified mice that lack the nerve channel Nav.17, Professor Wood says they’ve found that the key ingredient is the opioid peptides, and they’ve combined it with Nav1.7 blockers to recreate the mutation.

UCL researchers gave naloxone, an opioid blocker, to genetically altered mice that lack Nav1.7 - and they found that they were able to feel pain. And then they gave the blocker to a 39-year-old woman with the rare genetic, and for the first time in her life, she felt pain.

Nav.17 channel blockers are used as local anaesthetics, but scientists say they are not suitable for long-term human pain management because of their side effects, like complete numbness. By contrast, people with the rare disorder still feel non-painful touch normally, and inability to smell is the only known side-effect.

Meanwhile, UCL scientists say opioid painkillers like morphine are highly effective at reducing human pain, but their long-term use can lead to tolerance and dependence. As the patient or user become used to the opioid drugs, it become less effective so they will demand higher doses to experience the same effect. As a result, side effects of these drugs become more severe and eventually it stops working.

Professor Wood says the dose of opioid used in combination with the channel blockers is very low. Meanwhile, people with the rare disorder produce low levels of opioids throughout their lives without experiencing unpleasant side-effects, or developing tolerance to the drugs.

Professor Wood says they’re hoping to see “human testing” by year 2017, and after that, they can start looking into drug combinations and help millions of patients worldwide who suffer chronic pain. Source: StGist

SHARE