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Encyclopedia of Pain pp 1537–1542Cite as

Hypnotic Analgesia

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Definition

Psychological factors and interventions can sometimes powerfully modulate pain, and there is an emerging neurobiology of pain-modulatory mechanisms. Central neural mechanisms associated with such phenomena as placebo/nocebo, hypnotic suggestion (see Post-Hypnotic Suggestion), attention, distraction, and even ongoing emotions are now thought to modulate pain by decreasing or increasing neural activity within many of the brain structures shown in Fig. 1 (Rainville 2002). This modulation includes endogenous pain-inhibitory and pain-facilitation pathways that descend to spinal dorsal horn, the origin of ascending spinal pathways for pain as well as modulation, which takes place within cortico-limbic circuits once nociceptive information has reached cortical levels (De Pascalis et al. 2001; Fields and Price 1997; Hofbauer et al. 2001; Porro et al. 2002; Rainville 2002). Hypnotically induced reduction in pain is based on changes in pain induced by suggestions and facilitated by...

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Hypnotic Analgesia, Fig. 1
Hypnotic Analgesia, Fig. 2
Hypnotic Analgesia, Fig. 3

References

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Oral Surgery and Neuroscience, Mcknight Brain Institute University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA

    Donald D. Price

  2. Department of Stomatology, Faculty of Dental Medicine, University of Montreal, Montreal, QC, Canada

    Pierre Rainville

Authors
  1. Donald D. Price
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  2. Pierre Rainville
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Donald D. Price .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Anesthesiology, Center for Pain Research, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA

    Gerald F. Gebhart

  2. Physiologisches Institut der, Universität Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany

    Robert F. Schmidt

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Price, D.D., Rainville, P. (2013). Hypnotic Analgesia. In: Gebhart, G.F., Schmidt, R.F. (eds) Encyclopedia of Pain. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-28753-4_1831

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