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Nature Medicine 12, 1243–1244 (1 November 2006) | doi:10.1038/nm1106-1243

Feeling pain? Who's your daddy...

Gavril W Pasternak & Charles E Inturrisi

The most feared consequence of pain from disease or trauma is the possibility that it will become chronic, persisting long beyond the normal recovery time. However, not every herniated disc leads to chronic back pain and not every patient with herpes zoster infection develops postherpetic neuralgia.