MGH Center for Translational Pain Research, Department of Anesthesia and Critical Care, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts 02114, USA.
J Pain. 2009 Oct;10(10):1001-11. doi: 10.1016/j.jpain.2009.06.002. Epub 2009 Jul 22.
The achievements in both preclinical and clinical pain research over the past 4 decades have led to significant progress in clinical pain management. However, pain research still faces enormous challenges and there remain many obstacles in the treatment of clinical pain, particularly chronic pain. Translational pain research needs to involve a number of important areas including: 1) bridging the gap between pain research and clinical pain management; 2) developing objective pain-assessment tools; 3) analyzing current theories of pain mechanisms and their relevance to clinical pain; 4) exploring new tools for both preclinical and clinical pain research; and 5) coordinating research efforts among basic scientists, clinical investigators, and pain-medicine practitioners. These issues are discussed in this article in light of the achievements and challenges of translational pain research.
The subjective nature of clinical pain calls for innovative research approaches. As translational pain research emerges as an important field in pain medicine, it will play a unique role in improving clinical pain management through coordinated bidirectional research approaches between bedside and bench.
在过去的 40 年中，临床前和临床疼痛研究的成果使得临床疼痛管理取得了重大进展。然而，疼痛研究仍然面临着巨大的挑战，在治疗临床疼痛，特别是慢性疼痛方面仍然存在许多障碍。转化疼痛研究需要涉及多个重要领域，包括：1）弥合疼痛研究与临床疼痛管理之间的差距；2）开发客观的疼痛评估工具；3）分析当前的疼痛机制理论及其与临床疼痛的相关性；4）探索用于临床前和临床疼痛研究的新工具；5）协调基础科学家、临床研究人员和疼痛医学从业者的研究工作。本文结合转化疼痛研究的成就和挑战讨论了这些问题。
临床疼痛的主观性需要创新的研究方法。随着转化疼痛研究成为疼痛医学的一个重要领域，它将通过在床旁和实验台之间进行协调的双向研究方法，在改善临床疼痛管理方面发挥独特作用。
