UF receives $2.5 million grant to study postsurgical pain

A team of UF Health researchers received a $2.5 million federal grant to conduct a five-year study tracking information on post-surgical pain in hundreds of patients. Dr. Patrick Tighe, an assistant professor of anesthesiology at the UF College of Medicine, is the lead researcher on the study. He explained that the study will try to determine what genetic, chemical, psychological or social factors might play a role in some patients’ pain dissipating within a week after surgery, while the pain in others does not taper off and, in some cases, becomes chronic.