Prof. Etienne Vachon-Presseau, PhD student Christophe Tanguay-Sabourin and their research team are creating buzz in the pain community and the media for their brand new research paper published in Nature medicine. Researchers developed a model that takes into account the biological, psychological and social factors to identify and predict chronic pain.
Using data available from the UK Biobank of nearly 500,000 people, Etienne Vachon-Presseau’s research team and a number of Pain Network members have developed a model that incorporates biopsychosocial factors to predict that a number of coexisting pain sites in the body. Their model makes it possible to identify the risk of having various pain conditions or pain-related conditions as well as the development of widespread chronic pain as far as 9 years later. A number of key factors are at play, including insomnia, feeling of ‘fed-up’, being tired, stress and the body mass index, which is often used to estimate a person’s build. Such innovative model greatly contributes to chronic pain research and optimizing pain management tailored to each individual.
