One in five people in the United States experiences chronic pain. Despite its prevalence, safe and effective treatments are lacking. Yet evidence demonstrates that a psychological intervention can heal pain – even five years after therapy.
Yoni Ashar, PhD, assistant professor of internal medicine at CU Anschutz, conducted a randomized control trial in 2017-2018 that demonstrated Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) to be more effective than a placebo or usual care treatments for chronic back pain. This study found that ~67% of participants were pain-free or nearly pain-free after the treatment, compared to approximately 20% improvement in the control groups.
Five years later, a follow up with the original study participants revealed that more than half in the PRT group remained nearly or completely pain free.
Key points:
- A five-year follow-up study found that Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) produced long-lasting reductions in chronic back pain.
- In a randomized trial, two-thirds of patients became pain-free or nearly pain-free after treatment.
- Five years later, more than 50% of patients who received PRT remained pain-free or nearly pain-free.
- Chronic pain may be caused by brain-based pain sensitization, not ongoing injury.
- PRT works by helping patients reinterpret pain signals and reduce brain-based pain sensitization.
“It was so exciting to see people five years later saying, ‘I don’t have pain anymore,’” Ashar said. “Patients had nine, one-hour sessions with a therapist in the original study, and it had lasting impact on their pain.”
In this Q&A, Ashar discusses the implications of his research on chronic pain, including who benefits from PRT and how scientists have misunderstood the mechanisms of pain in the body.