MATHEMATICS HONORS DAY
Speaker: Karen J. Berkley
Title: Mechanisms of Pain: Lessons from the Laboratory
Affiliation: Florida State University
Date: Friday, April 7, 2006.
Place and Time: Room 101 - Love Building, 3:45 pm.
Reception: Room 204B - Love Building, 3:15 pm.
Abstract.
Research on pain has exploded since the 1960s, when "pain" became
recognized as a field of study and a clinical entity worthy of attention
on its own. Although we have learned a great deal, and we now have
hundreds of means by which to treat pain, much of it remains unalleviated.
Even amongst cancer patients, some estimates are that about 50% of patients
still suffer needlessly. Why? One possibility is that our conceptualization
of pain - as a pathway through the nervous system activated by the
"delivery of pain" - impedes progress. Instead, recent research
suggests that conceptualizing pain differently - as a perception
created for each individual within her/his central nervous system by
dynamic, distributed systems - may hasten progress in surprisingly
simple ways.
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