Chronic Back Pain Assoicated with Brain Shrinkage

Chronic back pain is associated with brain shrinkage and atrophy. This study was published in the Journal of Neuroscience 2004. Using MRI brain scan data and automated analysis techniques, the authors compared brain morphology of 26 chronic back pain patients to matched control subjects. They found that the patients with chronic back pain had 5-11% less neocortical gray matter volume than control subjects. This brain shrinkage is equivalent to 10-20 years of normal aging! The longer a person has chronic back pain, the more their brain shrinks.