I've been reading some articles of late similar to this one:
http://tinyurl.com/47wuhjn
If PN patients wish to improve by growing new nerves to replace those damaged ones, wouldn't a drug that halts formation of new synapses be counterproductive to that end?

Doc

That is a good question. That paper discusses brain development, not peripheral issues.

Synapses in the brain are pruned during development from infancy to adulthood. The question in that paper alludes to the fact that excess synapses are needed for learning and setting neuronal pathways in the brain. For example, a nerve cell may lose 2 or 3 dendrites with their synapses, while learning a skill. But the whole nerve cell system remains intact. This article states NEW synapses affected.

The nerve body, is not listed as affected. The synapses exist on the end of dendrites opposite to the axon.
If the axon goes, that cell then cannot communicate with any other nerve cell.

Medical treatment is full of things that destroy the body. SSRI drugs kill CELLS in the brain. This has been known for a long time now.

It is thought that some psychiatric drugs given to children, actually change them permanently. Hence the controversy with them.

I am not a huge fan of gabapentin or Lyrica. I think they are overprescribed. One sees on various internet boards, more problems than improvements with them.

I have noticed this often (and sadly) with the admission/acknowledgement that the side effects are preferable to the pain. Lesser of two elavils (pun intended).

Doc

It's actually not only children that these particular drugs can permanently alter- and there have been (and I believe, still are) class action lawsuits going on for the off-label prescription of gabapentin, and more recently, Lyrica.
What many people don't understand about Gabapentin is that it is a synthetic form of an amino acid found naturally in our bodies (Gamma Amino-Butyric Acid), and only when someone has a deficiency of this amino acid is it beneficial to ingest as a supplement. The synthetic form, as with anything synthetic, fails to provide the same benefits without the added side effects.
While Neurontin and Lyrica may provide some degree of relief for people who may need GABA, most people are not aware of all of the effects on both hormones and mental status, especially if you do not need the extra GABA.

Of course, these are all things that I've been told by some health food and alternative therapy junkies- I don't know much about the way the whole thing works myself, BUT -From my personal experience, these are dangerous options, of which the 'cons' far outweigh the 'pros'.

Here is a pretty good Wiki article on it... some interesting things that some people may not have known about it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabapentin

The links to cancer, I had not heard about before!