The Science Behind the Therapy

What does the brain have to do with my pain?

All pain is processed in the brain. And pain is always real. But in the majority of chronic cases, it’s a false alarm triggered by the nervous system. This is a very common phenomenon, in which the brain learns to interpret certain signals from the body as dangerous, even when there’s no structural injury. This is called neuroplastic or primary pain, and it’s the kind of pain that PRT is designed to treat.

Pain Reprocessing Therapy (PRT) is an evidence-based approach that helps people reduce or eliminate chronic pain by teaching the brain to unlearn these neural circuits. PRT works by helping you shift your relationship to pain through neuroscience education, somatic exercises, and emotional safety.

If you’ve been living with pain that won’t go away despite physical treatments, surgeries, or rest — the problem may not be in your body. PRT helps you retrain your brain to feel safe again, using proven, science-backed tools grounded in psychology and neuroscience.

Healing doesn’t mean ignoring the pain. It means changing the way your nervous system responds to it — and giving your brain new evidence of safety.

The Science - Some Key Studies

Key Study: The Boulder Back Pain Study

In this clinical trial, 151 people with chronic back pain were randomized into different treatment groups. Those who received PRT experienced:

  • 66% were pain-free or nearly pain-free after just 4 weeks of treatment

  • These improvements were maintained after 1 year follow-up

  • Brain scans showed reduced activity in pain-processing regions, confirming real neurological change

Placebo & Sham Studies

Placebo-controlled studies across various conditions show that context, belief, and brain interpretation play a major role in pain — sometimes even more than physical interventions.

  • In low back pain trials, sham acupuncture, sham spinal manipulation and even fake surgeries often reduce pain just as much as the real procedures

  • No difference in outcomes among people who received real knee surgery vs. those  who received a placebo “sham” surgery for osteoarthritis

Abnormal MRI findings do not reliably line up with physical symptoms

  • 64% of people with NO back pain have disc bulges, protrusions, and disc degeneration. These findings do not necessarily correlate with pain. This evidence is not new. Inconclusive findings related to medical imaging and symptoms have been found since the 1980s.

  • Spinal discs often heal after6 months in 60-80% of people (Zhong, 2017)

  • Among 70 young people with no pain, 43 had hip labral tears and 59 had hip pathology. Pathology does not always equal pain (Lee et al., 2015).

  • There are many, many, many more studies like this for many conditions.