INVITED AND SPECIAL SESSIONS
Thursday, October 27
11:00 AM-1:00 PM
Concurrent Invited Sessions II (26-32)
SESSION 28 - Genetics of Human Pain and Stress Response
Ballroom E-H
Moderator: David Goldman, National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Rockville, MD
The genetic basis of variability in pain sensitivity in humans is unknown. Pain is a complex trait, affected by a number of environmental and genetic factors. Attendees will be exposed to novel findings in the field of pain genetics. Approaches to measurement of pain phenotypes and mapping of genetic loci to the common symptoms in the context of clinical pain syndromes will be discussed. The discovery of common, functionally significant polymorphisms, which influence pain and stress responses, offers new opportunities to probe the mechanisms of multisomatoform pain disorders such as TMD, phantom or chronic back pain, and to better prevent and manage clinical pain.
11:00 AM Association between chronic pain levels and genetic variants in immune genes in patients with lubar radiculopathy. Inna Belfer, National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, Bethesda, MD.
11:30 AM Genetic markers of individual variations in pain perception and the development of painful TMD. Luda Diatchenko, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
12:00 NOON The Pain1 locus confers risk for chronic pain in rodents and for phantom limb pain and post-mastectomy pain syndromes in humans. Ruslan O. Dorfman, Hospital for Sick Children, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
12:30 PM Functional variation of COMT modulates pain/stress resiliency and vulnerability. David Goldman.
