Global Pain Therapeutics market shows scope for non-opioid Innovation: GlobalData

There is a lack of diversity within the current pain market, with non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) and opioids dominating the segment. With 98 per cent of currently marketed drugs for pain being generics, the market presents opportunities for innovation and development, according to GlobalData.

GlobalData’s report, “Global Pain Therapeutics Market and Modality Trends”, states that one of the research and development trends in pain treatment is the emergence of voltage-gated sodium channel inhibitors as a therapeutic modality for pain relief, providing an alternative to opioids.

Philippa Salter, Neurology Analyst at GlobalData, said, “Although opioids provide highly effective acute analgesia, they are associated with substantial risks of addiction, respiratory depression, and fatal overdose. Further, as patients develop tolerance to opioids, dose escalation is required to maintain therapeutic effect, resulting in their limited effectiveness for managing chronic pain. Therefore, the most important unmet need in the pain market, consistently highlighted by key opinion leaders (KOLs) interviewed by GlobalData, is the need for non-addictive alternatives to opioids.”

The recent approval of Vertex Pharmaceuticals’ Journavx (suzetrigine), a NaV1.8 voltage-gated sodium channel inhibitor, for moderate-to-severe acute pain in adults marks the first new class of pain medicine to be approved in more than 20 years.

Salter added, “KOLs agreed that while Journavx is a welcome non-addictive pain management option, it is not as effective at providing pain relief as they would like to see, especially when compared to opioids. Therefore, as pain is such a heterogenous indication, significant opportunities remain for a variety of different and more effective non-opioid treatment options to be developed.”

Developers are also exploring modalities beyond oral small molecules, including cell and gene therapies, to provide targeted and long-lasting pain management.

Salter continued, “According to GlobalData’s drugs database, as of January 2026, 39 per cent of the global pain pipeline consists of molecule types other than small molecules. Outside of pharmacological developments, other trends in the pain market include the development of neuromodulation techniques, as well as the use of digital therapeutics and wearable devices to improve pain management.”

The report notes that drug development in the pain market faces challenges. Pain is subjective, making it difficult to determine a drug’s efficacy in clinical trials. Pain trials are associated with placebo response rates, increasing the challenge of demonstrating efficacy. Chronic pain is heterogenous, with many patients experiencing a mixture of different pain types, making patient stratification for clinical trials a challenge.

Salter concluded, “However, regulatory incentives to develop non-opioid pain candidates, and innovation in trial designs, such as master protocol platform trials that allow multiple novel compounds to be evaluated across multiple pain types simultaneously, reducing development times and costs, mean significant interest remains in the pain market.”