For some people, it can lead to serious disability. This occurs when an arm or a leg has been removed because of illness or injury, but the brain still gets pain messages from the nerves that originally carried impulses from the missing limb. These nerves now seem to misfire and cause troubling pain. Nociceptors use nerve impulses to send messages to other nerves, which move the messages on to the spinal cord and brain at lightning speed. Pain is usually described as acute or chronic.
Acute pain is related to the physical sensations caused by an injury.
It can last from a few seconds to many weeks, but it usually goes away when normal healing occurs. Chronic pain lasts beyond the typical healing time. With neuropathic pain, the nerve fibers themselves may be damaged or injured. They then send incorrect signals to other pain centers. The pain you feel is real, but the cause is not easy to discover.