As we’ve talked about on the blog in the past, there is a clear link between sleep health and pain sensitivity, and we’re going to further explore the interconnections of these two things in today’s blog. A recent study published in the Journal of Science built on our knowledge of this connection, which leads to the question, can we sleep ourselves out of the cycle of chronic pain?

For their study, researchers took a closer look at a person’s brain and the pathways through which pain is perceived. This is the area that processes pain stimuli. In other words, it tells us where the pain sensation we’re feeling is coming from. This pain signal then moves to the insula, a part of the brain that integrates incoming signals and forms our perception of pain. Finally, that signal is sent to the nucleus accumbens, an area that plays a significant role in decision-making, reward and pain evaluation.

During their research, the team found that the activity of the nucleus accumbens in sleep deprived patients differed from those who regularly receive adequate amounts of sleep. The nucleus accumbens helps to dull incoming pain signals, but this process doesn’t occur as frequently or as greatly in patients who are sleep deprived.

Takeaways

The findings are in line with a previous study that found that burn victims increased their opioid consumption after just one night of interrupted sleep, which also reinforces the idea that sleep quality and our perception of pain is linked. But what does that mean for the average patient with chronic pain? It means you should focus on getting a healthy amount of quality sleep while also pairing that restful period with physical activity during the day. You’re not going to get rid of your chronic pain by laying in bed all day, but you’re also due for trouble if you get six hours of interrupted sleep each night.

Check out this old blog post on ways to improve your sleep quality, but we’ll provide some quick tips here. Get in the habit of going to bed at roughly the same time each night, make the room cool and as dark as possible, and avoid reading, watching Netflix or scrolling through your phone while in bed. Make the bedroom a place for sleeping and your body will begin to get in the habit of falling asleep and staying asleep. Also, avoid caffeine or alcohol late in the day as those beverages can make it harder to fall asleep and stay asleep.

Finally, you also need to pair this quality rest with activity. You need to put in some work to overcome your pain, whether that’s in the form of physical therapy, daily exercise or a regular stretching routine. These activites will help to increase our pain threshold and strengthen supportive muscle groups that can help prevent pain. Be active during the day and work on achieving quality sleep at night, and you may soon find your chronic pain under control! For help with any of this, reach out to Dr. Cohn’s office today.