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Updated: May 13, 2026

Burn Injury-Induced Pain and Depression-Like Behavior in Mice
Published on: September 29, 2021
Peripheral mechanisms of burn injury-associated pain
Helen Laycock1, Joao Valente, Carsten Bantel
1Section of Anaesthetics, Pain Medicine and Intensive Care, Department of Surgery and Cancer, Imperial College London, Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, 369 Fulham Road, London SW10 9NH, United Kingdom.
Abstract:
It is estimated that burn injury affects about 1 in 3000 people annually world-wide. Burn injury induces severe pain, which is difficult to control in the great majority of cases making burn injury-associated pain a serious clinical challenge. In order to meet this clinical need, novel targets should be identified. Like pain developing in other peripheral pathologies, burn injury-associated pain is also initiated and maintained by signalling between the injured tissues and primary sensory fibres that supply those tissues. This signalling is underlain by the formation and accumulation of a mixture of agents at the site of the injury, some of which could be targets for intervention. However, at present the composition of this "burn injury tissue fluid" is incompletely established. Here, we summarise our current understanding of the composition of this burn injury tissue fluid and explore how already known agents in that tissue fluid may activate nociceptors to initiate and maintain pain associated with burn injury.
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