University of Arizona Health Sciences
TUCSON, Ariz. — Lower levels of certain vitamins and minerals were found to be associated with chronic pain in a recently completed study led by researchers at the University of Arizona Health Sciences and published in Pain Practice.
This is the first study to take a precision medicine approach to chronic pain on a large scale by broadly examining micronutrient levels of people with and without chronic pain and exploring the incidence of chronic pain in people with or without micronutrient deficiencies. The findings could inform personalized nutritional strategies to help manage chronic pain.
“I treat chronic pain patients, and oftentimes we don’t come up with a diagnosis. But just because there isn’t a surgery that will help you doesn’t mean you’re not in pain. It’s just means that our understanding of pain is limited to date,” said senior author Julie Pilitsis, MD, PhD, head of the U of A College of Medicine – Tucson Department of Neurosurgery and member of the Comprehensive Center for Pain & Addiction. “This study is a novel way to approach chronic pain treatment, where you are looking at the patient holistically to see what could be going on systemically that is easily modifiable – changes in diet as opposed to medications or other things.”…