REVIEW ARTICLE
Modulatory Action of Voltage-gated Ion Channels in Inflammation and Inflammatory Pain
Senthilkumar Rajagopal1, *
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2023Volume: 17
E-location ID: e1874205X2212290
Publisher ID: e1874205X2212290
DOI: 10.2174/1874205X-v17-e230109-2022-12
Article History:
Received Date: 17/09/2022Revision Received Date: 22/11/2022
Acceptance Date: 24/11/2022
Electronic publication date: 01/02/2023
Collection year: 2023
open-access license: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0), a copy of which is available at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. This license permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
Pain is “an unpleasant sensory and emotional experience associated with actual or potential tissue damage, or described by the patient in terms of such damage”. The origin of every pain syndrome is inflammation. A group of voltage-gated channels that are permeable to calcium ions enhances sensory transduction witnessed during inflammation. Hence, understanding calcium signaling is an essential step towards recognizing neural network activity associated with pain management. In this review, we attempted to understand the impact of calcium-permeable ion channels in the recognition, processing, transduction and modulation of pain signals. Results obtained revealed that calcium being one of the most ubiquitous secondary messengers plays a significant role in modulating numerous biological processes, including inflammation and pain. Though almost all subtypes of calcium channels are highly expressed in the central nervous system (CNS), the “N-type calcium ion-channels” play an important function at the time of neurotransmitter release from the afferent terminals within the spinal dorsal. Hence, they serve as a key therapeutic target during the treatment of analgesics. Migraine is also reported to involve neurogenic inflammation. “P/Q-type calcium channels” is suggested to have an important role in migraine. The inhibition of these channels through various analgesics serves as a treatment against inflammatory and neuropathic pain. However, few of these inhibitors have numerous side effects, including cancer. Hence, these inhibitors may be consumed under the supervision of medical practitioners. In this review, we revealed the understanding and regulation of ion channels in inflammation causing pain and its treatment.
