As many as 1 in 5 people live with chronic pain, yet current treatment options remain deeply inadequate. Many patients cycle between therapies that provide limited relief, intolerable side effects, or carry significant risks such as dependence, overdose, and mortality. Chronic pain is increasingly understood as a disease of the nervous system, driven by persistent neuroinflammatory and neural sensitization processes that amplify pain signals and sustain suffering long after the original injury has healed. Addressing these underlying biological mechanisms represents a critical opportunity to transform how chronic pain is treated.