Body & HealthHow it works

How rubbing a bump makes it hurt less.

Pain travels to the spinal cord along thin, slow nerve fibres. Touch uses thick, fast ones. Both meet at the same relay point, a 'gate'. When a lot of touch signal arrives, it dampens the pain signal passing on to the brain. Melzack and Wall described this in 1965. Rubbing, stroking and TENS devices all work through this gate.

Useful: The reflex to rub a banged elbow is neurology, not superstition.

Source: en.wikipedia.org

NervenRueckenmarkSchmerz

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