DBT gears up to accelerate development of effective and non-addictive pain therapies

Mumbai, March 31, 2022:

With an aim to meet unmet need of pain management in the country, the Department of Biotechnology (DBT) under the ministry of science and technology has geared up to map the expertise available in the country in this area and build up a programme on ‘Chronic Pain Biology’ for gaining deeper insight into the pain mechanism and advancing research methodologies for developing targeted effective and non-addictive pain treatment options.

The DBT is mandated to promote research and development and translation research in the area of healthcare. Chronic pain is a debilitating symptom of many diseases and causes significant disability and reduces the quality of life. We still do not have any effective treatment options and it remains a major unmet global public health challenge. The difficulty in understanding and managing pain has also led to widespread overuse of, and addiction to opoids/morphine medications. This can lead to serious adverse outcomes.

Pain can be classified into three major groups: Nonciceptive, Neuropathic and Nociplastic. Nociceptive pain results from activity in neural pathways and is the most common form of the chronic pain encompassing arthritis and most forms of spinal pain. Neuropathic pain is caused by a damage or disease affecting the somatosensory nervous system, typically associated with sensory abnormalities such as numbness and allodynia. Approximately 15-25 per cent chronic pains are of neuropathic in nature and include diabetic neuropathy, postherpetic neuralgia and radiculopathy. Nociplastic pain is the pain arising from the abnormal processing of the pain signals without any clear association with damage, injury or disease pathology.

In order to address this challenge and improve the lives of people affected by pain conditions, better understanding of the mechanisms of pain and improved treatments are needed.

The DBT has recently invited expression of interest (EoI) from scientists/faculties, clinicians, engineers, computer scientists and biotechnologists engaged in a public and private universities/colleges/institutes to work on ‘Chronic Pain & its Management’ as a part of the Chronic/Lifestyle Disease Programme. The last date for submitting EoI is April 20, 2022.

The objective of inviting EoI is to map the current expertise in the country and to build a well-structured translational programme on Chronic Pain Biology by creating a niche group of experts in the area. Pharmabiz