Antioxidants offer pain relief to CP patients

Antioxidant supplementation is effective in relieving pain and reducing levels of oxidative stress in patients with chronic pancreatitis,  according to a new study published in the journal Gastroenterology.

In the placebo-controlled, double-blind trial, 127 patients were  assigned to placebo or antioxidant groups. After six months, the  reduction in the number of painful days per month was significantly  higher in the antioxidant group compared with the placebo group. The  reduction in the number of analgesic tablets per month was also higher  in the antioxidant group. Furthermore, 32% and 13% of patients became  pain free in the antioxidant and placebo groups, respectively; the  beneficial effect of antioxidants on pain relief was noted early at  three months.

"Abdominal pain, the predominant symptom in patients with CP, is  difficult to treat. The main reason for a largely ineffective medical  treatment is that the mechanism of pain in CP is not well understood,"  said lead author Pramod Garg. "We are encouraged by our findings, as  significant improvement was noted with antioxidants in respect to all  the parameters of pain in this study. In addition, reduction in pain  resulted in fewer man-days lost, thus providing functional employment  gain to the patients," he added.