High Times for Painful Blues: The Endocannabinoid System in Pain-Depression Comorbidity

Depression and pain are two of the most debilitating disorders worldwide and have an estimated cooccurrence of up to 80%. Comorbidity of these disorders is more difficult to treat, associated with significant disability and impaired health-related quality of life than either condition alone, resulting in enormous social and economic cost. Several neural substrates have been identified as potential mediators in the association between depression and pain, including neuroanatomical reorganization, monoamine and neurotrophin depletion, dysregulation of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis, and neuroinflammation. However, the past decade has seen mounting evidence supporting a role for the endogenous cannabinoid (endocannabinoid) system in affective and nociceptive processing, and thus, alterations in this system may play a key role in reciprocal interactions between depression and pain. This review will provide an overview of the preclinical evidence supporting an interaction between depression and pain and the evidence supporting a role for the endocannabinoid system in this interaction.

• Publication year

  2015

• Venue

  International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology

• Publication date

  2015-09-05

• Fields of study

  Medicine, Psychology

• Identifiers
  DOI 10.1093/ijnp/pyv095PMID 26342110PMCID 4815466
• External record

  Open on Semantic Scholar

• Source metadata

  Semantic Scholar, PubMed

• Preclinical evidence supports an interaction between depression and pain.

  Confidence 0.90

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• The endocannabinoid system is implicated as a key mediator in reciprocal interactions between depression and pain.

  Confidence 0.93

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review

• affective processing

  process

  Neural processing related to emotion and mood discussed as one functional domain affected by cannabinoid signaling.

  Aliases: emotional processing

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• depression and pain

  conditions

  The paired disorders of depressive symptoms and painful conditions discussed as interacting clinical states.

  Aliases: depression-pain

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• endocannabinoid system

  biological system

  The endogenous cannabinoid signaling network discussed as a candidate biological contributor to affective and nociceptive regulation.

  Aliases: ECS

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• nociceptive processing

  process

  Neural processing of pain-related stimuli and signals discussed as one functional domain affected by cannabinoid signaling.

  Aliases: pain processing

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• pain-depression comorbidity

  condition

  The co-occurrence of depression and pain in the same individuals, which is the central clinical problem addressed in the review.

  Aliases: depression-pain comorbidity

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• preclinical evidence

  evidence base

  Experimental evidence from non-human or laboratory models used to examine links between depression and pain.

  Aliases: preclinical data

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review
• reciprocal interactions between depression and pain

  relationship

  A bidirectional relationship in which each condition may influence the other.

  Aliases: bidirectional depression-pain interaction

  박진우 (dztg5apj7m) extractionAK (4715169a40) reviewq (76h6bfydm6) reviewKiller Whale (322360f1c1) reviewB (s683577b42) reviewAnonymous (12632b8b5f) review

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