Can’t stop scratching? Breakthrough makes drug to stop ALL types of itch – from skin conditions to insect bites

July 20, 2016

Scientists find protein that tells brain something has irritated our skin
And, in turn, it is time to start scratching to try and ease the irritation
Protein is called TRPV4. It is involved in processing the type of itch produced by insect bites and that provoked by allergy to a medicine

Fiona Macrae Science Editor For The Daily Mail

Published:
08:36 EST, 20 July 2016

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Updated:
08:36 EST, 20 July 2016

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Scientists have identified a protein that tells the brain something has irritated our skin and it is time to start scratching

Scientists may have put their finger on how to stop an itch.

They have identified a protein that tells the brain something has irritated our skin and it is time to start scratching.

Excitingly, the compound may be key to multiple types of itch – meaning a drug that stops it from working could make life more pleasant for millions.

While insect bites and washing powder allergies can be maddening while they last, itching is also part and parcel of illnesses from eczema to diabetes and kidney disease.

And some cancer patients find their painkillers irritate their skin so much that they have no option but to cut back on them.

The breakthrough, from Washington University, Missouri, centres on a cluster of cells that help transmit itch signals from the skin to the brain.

The researchers identified a protein in the cells which is called TRPV4 and is involved in processing the type of itch produced by insect bites and the type of itch provoked by an allergy to a medicine.

This is important because it had been thought that different types of itch were processed separately and so required different types of drug.

The researchers think the protein might also be involved in other types of itch – meaning a drug that stops it from working could help everyone from holidaymakers peppered with mosquito bites to cancer patients.

Writing in the journal Science Signalling, researcher Zhou-Feng Chen said: ‘It gives us new therapeutic targets.

‘We may be able to inhibit multiple types of itching.’

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While insect bites and washing powder allergies can be maddening while they last, itching is also part and parcel of illnesses from eczema to diabetes and kidney disease

Dr Chen, who rather appropriately runs his university’s Centre for the Study of the Itch, has previously proved that mother was right when she said that scratching makes an itch worse.

He showed that while scratching provides temporary relief, it quickly triggers the production of a brain chemical that makes the itch even more annoying.

It appears that scratching initially helps by creating pain.

Nerve cells in the spinal cord are kept busy transmitting pain signals to the brain, leaving fewer to tell the brain about the itch.

But when the brain registers the soreness caused by our fingernails scraping across our skin, it releases the chemical serotonin.

This is meant to dull the pain but also intensifies the itch, leading to a vicious circle of more scratching, more serotonin being released – and more itching.