Pain Research

The department of Anesthesiology has active research groups that focus on studies on the improvement of perioperative outcome, acute and chronic pain, opioid epidemiology, ventilatory control and pharmacology of opioids and anesthetics, including psychedelics (ketamine) and muscle relaxants.

This research is mechanistic and therapeutic in nature and is aimed at the development and application of novel diagnostic tools (such as Cornea Confocal Microscopy (CCM) and Quantitative Sensory Testing (QST)) in chronic pain. By combining multiple tools specific pain phenotypes are detected that present themselves irrespective of the underlying disease. Each phenotype requires a specific and unique treatment paradigm. In this line of research precision medicine is combined with personalized medicine.

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This research is mechanistic and therapeutic in nature and is aimed at the development and application of novel diagnostic tools (such as Cornea Confocal Microscopy (CCM) and Quantitative Sensory Testing (QST)) in chronic pain. By combining multiple tools specific pain phenotypes are detected that present themselves irrespective of the underlying disease. Each phenotype requires a specific and unique treatment paradigm. In this line of research precision medicine is combined with personalized medicine.

The therapeutic part of this line of research is aimed at optimizing the treatment of acute and chronic pain by maximizing pain relief while simultaneously minimizing toxicity (e.g. respiratory depression, sedation). By creating so called Utility Functions of individual drugs in specific populations, treatment is optimized by choosing those drugs with the most favourable utility functions. This line of research has gained the interest of the laymen’s press and is widely sponsored by the pharma industry. It also has close links to finding a solution to the opioid epidemic that not only occurs in the US but also in the Netherlands.