Women who don’t need pain relief in childbirth have ‘genetic variation which creates higher pain threshold’

‘We could use the findings to create new pain relief by targeting this gene to treat chronic pain,’ says researcher. Maya Oppenheim reports

The Cambridge University study discovered that one in 100 women carry the genetic trait (Getty)

Women who do not need pain relief during labour could have a genetic variation that gives them a higher pain threshold, a major new study has found.

Researchers found that one in 100 women carry the genetic trait, which restricts the nerve cells’ capacity to transmit pain signals to the brain.

The Cambridge University study found the genetic variant, which serves as a natural epidural, does this by triggering a so-called defect in the “formation of the switch” on the nerve cells which means “it takes a much greater signal – in other words, stronger contractions during labour – to switch it on”.