2013-069 – NORBIRT & DANBIRT Therapeutics to Control Chronic Neuropathic Pain

Background Persistent, recurring pain, defined as pain lasting longer than three months, is a common health problem for up to twenty-five percent of Americans today. Only a fraction of these people, between thirty and fifty percent, receive adequate treatment and relief from the therapeutics that are currently available to them. Neuropathic pain is often associated with peripheral nerve injury often caused by compression, transection, or inflammation. When such injured tissues persist for extended periods of time, an ongoing excitation in primary sensory pain neurons located in the dorsal root ganglia occur, causing chronic pain. Recent scientific evidence has shown that neuropathic pain occurs in part due to immune and glial cell activation in the spinal cord and dorsal root ganglia. However, the vast majority of current pain therapeutics target only neurons, an approach that significantly limits the effectiveness of the treatment. Given that, there exists a significant need for new, more effective treatment methods for patients experiencing persistent pain. Such a treatment should exhibit a higher effectiveness for all patients and should be an alternative for the large fraction of patients who do not receive sufficient pain relief from current pain therapeutic options. Technology Description Researchers at the University of New Mexico have identified a combination of novel therapeutic compounds that play a role in the suppression of neuropathic pain. These compounds have yielded data that suggest a new drug target in current pain research. This technology has the capacity to develop a revised understanding of neuroimmune signaling in response to pathological pain as well as to identify a new class of pain therapeutics. Such therapeutics would exhibit a higher level of effectiveness and could provide a more comprehensive pain treatment than those currently in existence. Gregg Banninger GBanninger@innovations.unm.edu 505-272-7908