Hot Sauce for Pain Relief

For years my wife has said that I didn’t have any taste buds left in my mouth because I like spicy peppers. Maybe I’m just ahead of my time and am building up immunity to pain (it hasn’t worked yet). In any event, I ran across this bit of news that I thought was rather unusual and should warm you up a bit.

Scientists are testing if the stuff that makes the sauces so savage can tame the pain of surgery. Doctors are dripping the chemical that gives chili peppers their fire directly into open wounds during knee replacement and a few other highly painful operations. The volunteers are under anesthesia so they don't scream at the initial burn.

How could something searing possibly soothe? Bite a hot pepper, and after the burn your tongue goes numb. The hope is that bathing surgically exposed nerves in a high enough dose will numb them for weeks, so that patients suffer less pain and require fewer narcotic painkillers as they heal.