Irene Tracey on pain in the brain

The Life Scientific

BBC

Technology, Personal Journals, Society & Culture, Science

4.6 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 2 April 2019

⏱️ 29 minutes

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Summary

Pain, as we know, is highly personal. Some can cope with huge amounts, while others reel in agony over a seemingly minor injury. Though you might feel the stab of pain in your stubbed toe or sprained ankle, it is actually processed in the brain. That is where Irene Tracey, Nuffield Professor of Anaesthetic Science at Oxford University, has been focussing her attention. Known as the Queen of Pain, she has spent the past two decades unravelling the complexities of this puzzling sensation. She goes behind the scenes, as it were, of what happens when we feel pain - scanning the brains of her research subjects while subjecting them to a fair amount of burning, prodding and poking. Her work is transforming our understanding, revealing how our emotions influence our experience of pain, how chronic pain develops and even when consciousness is present in the brain. Producer: Beth Eastwood

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Doleepa, and I'm at your service.
0:04.7	Join me as I serve up personal conversations with my sensational guests.
0:08.8	Do a leap interviews, Tim Cook.
0:11.2	Technology doesn't want to be good or bad.
0:15.0	It's in the hands of the creator.
0:16.7	It's not every day that I have the CEO of the world's biggest company in my living room.
0:20.7	If you're looking at your phone more than you're looking in someone's eyes, you're doing the wrong thing.
0:26.0	Julie, at your service.
0:28.0	Listen to all episodes on BBC Sales.
0:31.0	Welcome to the Life Scientific Podcast. I'm Jim Alkulele and my guest is Irene
0:36.6	Tracy, a world expert on pain and our perception of it. She explains something I've
0:42.2	been wondering about since I was a teenager, keen to impress a girl
0:45.8	I was smitten with. I tripped while leapfrogging over a garden fence, fell head first into the mud and
0:51.7	fractured my wrist.
0:53.0	Now the thing is I was far too embarrassed and distracted by this girl to notice any pain.
0:58.0	In today's episode of the Life Scientific, I finally find out why.
1:02.0	Pain, as we all know, is high. of the life scientific, I finally find out why.
1:03.0	Pain, as we all know, is highly personal.
1:06.0	Some seem to cope with huge amounts,
1:08.0	while others real in agony over what might look like a minor injury.
1:12.0	And although we might feel the sharp pain in the place it happens,
1:15.6	a stubbed toe or a burned finger, the sensation is actually processed in the brain.
	...

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