Shingles can cause severe chronic pain – new research on how exosomes alter neurons offers pathways to treatment

Post-herpetic neuralgia, chronic pain following shingles, affects up to 18% of shingles patients and can persist for years, with less than half getting meaningful relief from current treatments. New research published in Annals of Neurology found that blood particles called exosomes from these patients carry elevated proteins that suppress neuron growth.

When researchers exposed human sensory neurons in a dish to these exosomes, the neurons failed to grow properly and became hypersensitive to pain signals, unlike neurons exposed to exosomes from people without the condition. The team believes the same mechanism might explain other neuropathies, like diabetic nerve pain, and is now tracking blood samples over a year to confirm the pattern.

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