Key takeaway 1 : Pain and injury can be dissociated

Radiations can trigger enormous amount of damages. Yet, one will feel nothing at the time he receives the radiations.

Conversely, there can be an enormous amount of pain while no damage is actually there (well-known story of a construction worker who thought a nail has gone through its feet).

In conclusion, pain and physical damage are dissociative. There is a mental component to pain.

Key takeaway 2 : Brain real estate for a body part is proportional to density of receptors in that body part

Your back is much bigger than your fingertip in terms of volume, surface, … But the brain area devoted to your fingertip is much larger than the one devoted to your back.

What matters is not the size but the density of the receptors in a body part. And that determines sensitivity.

Key takeway 3 : More sensitive parts heal faster

More sensitive parts have more receptors. But they also have more blood vessels.

Pain such body parts will be higer. But healing will also be faster.

Key takeaway 4 : The brain can be plastic very rapidly

People missing a limb usually experience pain because they experience the limb in its last position (usually, if you are amputated, its last position was not comfortable).

Ramachadran performed studies where he had people missing a limb put in a setup using mirrors such that they could see the missing limb as it was there thanks to a reflection of the other limb (hand, leg, …). And therefore, they could see the missing limb moving as if it was there. And these people experienced quick relief of their symptoms by placing the intact limb (and therefore the phantom limb through the mirrors) in a relaxed position and the feeling continued after leaving the setup.

This proves the brain can be plastic very rapidly. And that top-down processes for managing pain can be very efficient.

Key takeaway 5 : Pain is a perceptual thing

Not to diminish the pain of anybody. But pain is a perceptual thing. It has another layer aside the physical aspects of things.

Indeed, the human brain takes sensory inputs and has to make sense of it through its model of the world. Therefore, pain is in the end a belief system. And knowing this has powerful implications in treating and dealing with pain and handling different sorts of pain adequately.

Key takeaway 6 : Broke your left leg ? Cast the right one !

Studies have shown that when a limb is injured, allowing the injured limb to move (without pain) while restricting the other limb (to force the injured limb to do some work) allows faster recovery and avoid atrophy.

Indeed, atrophy happens not only because the limb is not moving but mainly necause there are no more signals from the brain sent to that limb. This has implications such as brain space for the injured limb becoming smaller and nerves of the injured limb becoming less active.

Key takeaway 7 : The brain sewage system is active during sleep

The brain's glymphatic system, responsible for clearing debris inside the brain (dead tissues, … prominent when you have had a concussion or traumatic brain injury (TBI)), is more active during sleep.

So, if you have had a TBI, get more sleep. And even if you did not… Get more sleep! (Well … not more … just get an adequate amount of sleep!)

Key takeaway 8 : Get your LSD in folks !

Long slow distance activates the brain glymphatic system. More specifically, zone 2 cardio (so easy cardio, kind of cardio that you can do while still having a conversation) helps the glymphatic system to trigger and perform.

This is not true with High Intensity trainig.

Key takeaway 9 : Love blunts the pain

Experiments have shown that when people were thinking about somebody (or something or a pet) they truly love, they are able to withstand higher pain thresholds. Or the pain feels lesser.

And people obssessed with someone have that effect even greater.

In fact this is not truly love that blocks the pain… it's more the dopamine associated to that that blunts the pain.

Key takeaway 10 : Acupunture … The scientific data

Acupuncture works to deal with the pain. And it does so through dopamine.

Acunpuncture is now studied extensively. And these studies have shown the close relationship between the somatosensory system and the nervous system as well as the ability through this communication to raise or lower the autonomic state. The studies show that depending on the intensity of the signal (heat or electricity or needle) and the location of the signal (where in the body), you can get very different response. So one can't say acunpunture is good or acupuncture is bad. Because depending on how you apply acupuncture, you can get one effect or the opposite. For example, strong stimulation of the midsection (think core) increases inflammation. Now inflammation is generally not desired if everything is fine but if the individual is facing some infection in his guts or stomach, that could be useful.

Key takeaway 11 : The IceMan breathing (aka Wim Hof)

Wim Hof practices breathing patterns that (and this has been monitored under clinical setup) can help combat infection or diseases. And this is no magic trick. It's just that the type of breathing he does trigger an increase of adrenaline. It triggers the stress response. And the stress response helps fight infection.

This is an embedded mechanism within humans to help our survival. When conditions are tough (cold, hunger), our bodies increase the adrenaline so that we can be active (search for food, …) but also so that we don't get sick. And usually, when things get better and the stress response stop (hopefully), that's when people get sick (getting sick after hard period of work ? hard period of exams ?).

So such response and increase of immunity can be triggered by breathing practices but it can basically be triggered by anything that increases the adrenaline (sport practices, ice baths, …)

Key takeaway 12 : Injury : don't ice

For an injury (sprained ankle, muscle tear, …) the typical go-to is to ice it. Well in fact you shouldn't. Ice acts as an analgesic but it slows down the healing process by increasing the viscosity of the fluids, by creating fascia sludge, … While when injured you actually want things moving (macrophages that carry the debris) and gliding (fascia, adhesions). Furthermore, it has been shown that when cooling neural pathways, the pathway gets numbed down. But when cooling is removed, the pathway triggers again with a greater intensity. In the case of a pain pathway … With greater pain !

So for an injury, the big three are in fact : sleep, movement and heat. For movement, one wants to make movements that DO NOT increase the pain or the injury. So a slow walk. At least 10 minutes.