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Chronic Pain Produces Reversible Memory Deficits That Depend on Task Difficulty in Rats
Caroline E Phelps1, Edita Navratilova1, Frank Porreca1
1Department of Pharmacology, Arizona Health Sciences Center, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona.
The Journal of Pain
|May 23, 2021
Summary
Chronic pain impairs memory, especially on difficult tasks, by consuming limited cognitive resources. Duloxetine treatment relieved these memory deficits in a rat model.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Pain Research
- Cognitive Science
Background:
- Cognitive impairment in chronic pain is poorly understood.
- Analgesic drugs and comorbidities complicate pain-cognition relationship studies.
- Spinal nerve ligation (SNL) in rats models chronic pain states.
Purpose of the Study:
- To assess the impact of chronic pain on short- and long-term memory.
- To investigate if chronic pain consumes limited cognitive resources.
- To evaluate the effect of duloxetine on pain-related memory deficits.
Main Methods:
- Rats underwent spinal nerve ligation (SNL) or sham surgery.
- Memory was tested using the novel object recognition task with varying difficulty (easy vs. difficult object pairs).
- Duloxetine was administered to SNL rats to assess its effects on pain and memory.
Main Results:
- Nerve-injured rats showed no memory deficits on easy tasks.
- Injured rats exhibited short- and long-term memory deficits on difficult tasks.
- Duloxetine reduced pain hypersensitivity and improved long-term memory in difficult tasks.
Conclusions:
- Chronic pain reversibly consumes significant cognitive resources, impacting memory performance.
- Memory deficits in chronic pain are task-dependent, appearing under high cognitive load.
- Duloxetine offers potential benefits for pain-related cognitive dysfunction through pain relief and possible cognitive enhancement.
