What is the first thing doctors do when they encounter a Snake Bite (Or a Spider Bite/Insect Bite/Scorpion Sting/Jellyfish Sting etc) victim? The first thing they do is identify the snake which bit the victim and infer if the snake was a poisonous one or not. If the victim is unlucky enough to get bitten by a poisonous one, the docs bring in the stuff that fights the venom of the snake. Better known as Anti-Venom. And you’d be surprised to know what is the stuff which is used as Anti-Venom, its the venom itself. The venom is then diluted and injected into a horse, sheep, goat or cat. The subject animal will undergo an immune response to the venom, producing antibodies against the venom's active molecule which can then be harvested from the animal's blood and used to treat envenomation. It is quite possible to immunize a person directly with small and graded doses of venom rather than an animal. According to Greek history, King Mithridates did this in order to protect himself against attempts of poisoning, therefore this procedure is often called mithridatization.
All this information about Anti-Venom because I came across an article somewhere that says can inducing more pain helps you get rid of the existing pain. Just like in case of Anti-Venom where a poison is injected to fight an already existing poison, can some new pain fight an already existing pain? Can it make a person immune to pain? The new pain may not be of the same type or something which would aggravate the existing pain, I mean I’m not saying punching on a already bruised area will make you feel any better :-) thats never gonna happen. Also the new pain may not exactly cure your existing pain, all it can do is maybe divert your mind from it, which may be quite useful because a major portion of the pain is psychological. If induced in a controlled manner, I feel this tactic may prove to be effective against severe pain i.e Pain to Fight Pain. Hope they do some more research on this.
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