Duloxetine reduces pain and boosts mood among patients with Chronic musculoskeletal pain

According to the researchers, Duloxetine is efficacious in managing CMP patients.

Chronic musculoskeletal pain (CMP) is a complex condition and is majorly faced by older people affecting normal work and life. Long-term chronic pain affects patients’ psychology and mood and may induce depression, anxiety, or other diseases. The treatment goal is to relieve pain.

Clinical studies have shown that opioids can play a role in antidepressant treatment by modulating the neurotransmitter system, but side effects and dependence cannot be ignored.

Duloxetine, a norepinephrine and serotonin reuptake inhibitor (NSRI), can play an antidepressant and analgesic role.

In the present study, researchers found that the depression symptoms of patients with CMP treated with Duloxetine are reduced, and it also improves the mood index. Treated patients are more active in normal interpersonal communication and work life than patients in the placebo control group. The main purpose of the study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Duloxetine in treating CMP using data from PubMed, Web of Science, Embase, and Cochrane Library.

This study entitled “Efficacy and safety of duloxetine in chronic musculoskeletal pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis” was published in BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders explains finding based on information obtained from 13 articles and studied a population of 4201 participants in 4 countries.

The main results of the study could be summarised as follows:

• Duloxetine has statistically more significant than placebo control.
• Benefits were reported on 24-hour average pain, living quality, physical function, and global impressions.
• There was no difference in the incidence of serious adverse events.
• Duloxetine can improve mood and pain levels at the same time.

Concluding further, they said that Duloxetine contributes to CMP symptom relief. To be more precise, Duloxetine significantly reduces the pain level of patients, improves depressive symptoms and global impression without serious adverse reactions.”

Drugs have side effects. We need to explore the potential issues of Duloxetine in the treatment of CMP in the future, they said.

Further reading:

Ma, X., Zhou, S., Sun, W. et al. Efficacy and safety of Duloxetine in chronic musculoskeletal pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis. BMC Musculoskelet Disord 24, 394 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12891-023-06488-6