How Your Body Processes Pain

Information may not be reliable

For the purpose of this article, we will explore nociceptive pain or pain due to tissue injury or physical trauma.

Okay, so you are walking barefoot on the beach and enjoying the beautiful sunset and the roaring of the waves of the sea with your beloved’s hand in yours and you think to yourself: can life get any better than this? Just as you take your next step, the whole world goes dark and you jump impulsively only to open your eyes staring at the sole of your foot now in your hand with a nail stuck in it. OH, the PAIN!!!!...

This is what happened from the moment you stepped on that nail, the transmission of the impulse through your nervous system to the brain and your awareness of the pain you felt.

The first thing that happens is that the pain receptors, known as nociceptors, in the skin of the sole of your foot were activated by the tissue damage, the nail in your foot. These, in turn, send a signal, which is electrical, up the peripheral nerve to the spinal cord. In the spinal cord, this electrical impulse is further relayed to other nerves by chemicals called neurotransmitters, from where it is carried to the brain.

In the brain, it is further relayed by the thalamus (the brain’s switchboard) which then passes the message over to the somatosensory cortex (where the pain is felt), the limbic system (for emotional response) and the frontal cortex (where you think and decide about the next step about the pain you felt). By the way, nerve pain is probably one of the worst pains possible.

This, my friend is the way pain is processed from the moment of impact, stepping on that nail, to when it is felt and action is taken about it; you holding your foot in your hand and seeing the nail stuck in your foot. All these take place at a fraction of a second, pain travels at the speed of 0.61 meters per second.