Nutrition and Diet for Pain Prevention and Treatment
A special issue of Nutrients (ISSN 2072-6643). This special issue belongs to the section "Nutrition and Public Health".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 February 2025) | Viewed by 1041
Special Issue Editors
Interests: chronic pain; neuroscience (preclinical/clinical); neuroimmunoinflammation; pain BioPsicoSocialEconomic impact; long COVID syndrome; interdisciplinarity; metadisciplinarity; disease awareness
Interests: pharmacology and toxicology; preclinical and clinical studies of inflammatory and neuroinflammatory diseases; endocannabinoids and natural substances as antioxidants and anti-inflammatories
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Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Advances in scientific research have allowed us to acquire, with increasing certainty, that chronic pain is a disease in itself and that, equally, it is difficult to treat and manage and generates a biological, psychological, social, and economic impact both for the person and for society as a whole. Nevertheless, the need to ensure adequate recovery of pain-induced disability remains unmet
Even today, the therapeutic successes obtained with an exclusively biomedical approach are unsatisfactory and suggest the need to adopt a paradigm shift towards a strategy based on a more holistic approach, hence the emerging interest in the relationship between pain and lifestyle.
Behavioral lifestyle factors (physical activity, stress, sleep disturbances, and an unhealthy diet) are increasingly recognized as crucial factors for the triggering and chronicization of chronic pain.
In 2020, the IASP, based on a large body of evidence indicating the significant effect of nutrition-based interventions on pain reduction, recognized that the relationship between nutrition and chronic pain is important, complex and bidirectional and that optimizing dietary intake in pain management strategies is equally important.
The relationship between nutrition and chronic pain is not yet fully understood, but we can say that it is complex and may involve many underlying (shared) mechanisms, such as oxidative stress, inflammation, and glucose metabolism. Understanding these mechanisms can potentially increase the effectiveness of nutritional assessments and treatments in managing chronic pain: this is also why modern pain management should be multifaceted and include an interdisciplinary approach.
However, nutrition has traditionally been underrepresented in the evidence-based biopsychosocial and lifestyle approach for multimodal and personalized pain management. Instead, healthcare professionals should be aware of all the components involved in pain management, including nutrition, and be able to identify nutrition-related risk factors associated with chronic pain and provide basic nutrition-based treatment strategies. Finally, they should know if, when, and how to refer to a dietician when necessary.
Therefore, pain management requires a comprehensive, interdisciplinary approach that includes nutrition as it is the main modifiable lifestyle factor for chronic non-communicable diseases, including chronic pain.
Based on the above, it is with great pleasure that I invite you to submit contributions to this Special Issue entitled “Diet and Nutrition for Pain Prevention and Treatment”.
The purpose of this Special Issue is:
- Summarize the existing evidence on the correlation between nutrition and chronic pain (pain “”disease”, ICD 11th Ed);
- Highlight the potential underlying mechanisms that explain the interaction between nutrition and chronic pain and provide targets for mechanism-oriented therapy;
- Analytically describe the preclinical and clinical efficacy of both the prevention and management of chronic pain (documented and prospective) of active ingredients present in food;
- Present clinical studies aimed at demonstrating a pain-relieving effect resulting from dietary changes represent the bidirectional interaction between nutrition and chronic pain.
Dr. Maurizio Evangelista
Dr. Rosalia Crupi
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
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Keywords
- chronic pain
- ICD-11
- diet interventions
- lifestyle
- nutrients
- pathogenetic mechanisms
- neuroimmunoinflammation
- comorbidities
- disease awareness
- interdisciplinarity
- chronic non specific low back pain
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