Pathological injury, defined

Norenberg, MD, Smith, J, and Marcillo, A. 2004. The pathology of human spinal cord injury Defining the problems. /Neurotrauma 21(4) 429-440. 

The biological response to chemical insult may take numerous forms, depending on the physicochemical properties of the material and the conditions of exposure. Listed below are some of the more significant and frequendy encountered types of injury or toxic response they may be defined in terms of tissue pathology, altered or aberrant biochemical processes, or extreme physiological responses. 

Neuropathic pain is defined as spontaneous pain and hypersensitivity to pain associated with damage to or pathologic changes in the peripheral nervous system as in painful diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN), acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), polyneuropathy, post-herpetic neuralgia (PHN) or pain originating in the central nervous system (CNS), that which occurs with spinal cord injury, multiple sclerosis, and stroke. Functional pain, a relatively newer concept, is pain sensitivity due to an abnormal processing or function of the central nervous system in response to normal stimuli. Several conditions considered to have this abnormal sensitivity or hyperresponsiveness include fibromyalgia and irritable bowel syndrome. 

Finally, there are several instances in which the activity of the Na+/H+ exchanger contributes to pathological states. The most clearly defined state is reperfusion-induced cardiac injury. 

Although the etiology of autism is not understood, the defining or core symptoms of autistic disorder are considered to be impaired social interaction, impaired verbal and nonverbal communication, and restrictive, repetitive patterns of behavior. In addition, most patients with a primary diagnosis of autism exhibit other neurological or psychiatric symptoms, which may include seizures, sleep disorders, anxiety, panic attacks, attention deficit/hyperactivity, self-injury, and cognitive impairment (Simonoff et ah, 2008). It is not known to what extent these comorbidities reflect the primary pathology of autism and to what extent they represent unrelated vulnerabilities that are exacerbated by the impaired social interaction and communication that is characteristic of the disorder. 

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