The Neurobiology of Pain and Analgesia

Keystone Symposia, Silverthorne CO

Investigators

Abstract

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This proposal is to request support for a Keystone Symposia meeting entitled "The Neurobiology of Pain and Analgesia", organized by Clifford J. Woolf, Ardem Patapoutian and Simon Tate, which will be held in Santa Fe, New Mexico from February 22-27, 2009. This symposium will highlight the substantial advances made in our understanding of the neurobiology and pathophysiology of pain and the enormous opportunities these present for identifying and exploiting new targets for therapy. Current therapy is largely empirical and is based on suppressing symptoms. The future offers treatment targeted at the specific neural mechanisms responsible. This requires understanding the mechanisms, being able to identify which mechanism operates in which patient, and having pharmacological tools to act on the molecular targets that drive these mechanisms. Furthermore, we need to identify which patient is at risk of developing pain and develop preventative disease modifying treatments to abort the establishment of pain. This symposium will address how these goals can be achieved by the combined effort of academics and industry. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Pain is an area of enormous unmet clinical need. The efficacy of existing analgesic drugs is generally unsatisfactory;many patients do not respond and the reduction in pain in responders is limited. Moreover, adverse effects are common, with opioids additionally having a high risk of diversion and abuse. We anticipate that the meeting will challenge existing paradigms for analgesic development and facilitate the rapid deployment of new technologies and strategies.