A new perspective article highlights a compelling theory about migraine attacks: that they are an integrated mechanism by which the brain protects and repairs itself. Recent insightful findings and potential ways to use them ...
Oct 19, 2017
0
3423
(HealthDay)—Osmophobia is prevalent among patients with different migraine subtypes, and it also occurs in some patients with tension-type headaches, according to a study published online Sept. 13 in the Journal of Headache ...
Oct 8, 2021
0
59
Although exercise is often prescribed as a treatment for migraine, there has not previously been sufficient scientific evidence that it really works. However, research from the Sahlgrenska Academy has now shown that exercise ...
Oct 10, 2011
0
0
New, long-acting drugs may hold hope for millions of people who often suffer migraines. Studies of two of these medicines, given as shots every month or so, found they cut the frequency of the notoriously painful and disabling ...
Nov 30, 2017
0
836
Until this year, migraine sufferers had to make do with drugs originally developed for other medical conditions, such as high blood pressure or depression. Now, there are three new drugs that were developed just for preventing ...
Oct 10, 2018
0
14
A drug belonging to a new generation of acute migraine headache treatments was found to eliminate pain and reduce bothersome symptoms for people with migraine in a large-scale trial reported in the July 11 issue of The New ...
Jul 10, 2019
0
268
Neuroscientists of the University of Zurich shed a new light on the mechanisms responsible for familial migraine: They show that a genetic dysfunction in specific brain cells of the cingulate cortex area strongly influences ...
Jun 24, 2020
0
400
One of the things Egilius L.H. Spierings has learned over nearly 40 years of practice remains controversial in headache medicine, but it seems intuitive to anyone who has found that a shoulder massage can ease a headache.
Mar 11, 2016
1
130
(HealthDay)—There is a bidirectional association between anxiety and depression and migraine and tension-type headache (TTH), according to a study published online Jan. 21 in The Journal of Headache and Pain.
Feb 7, 2022
0
2
(HealthDay)—The millions of Americans who suffer from migraine may have a new source of hope—the first drug aimed at preventing the headaches gained U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval on Thursday.
May 18, 2018
0
402
Migraine is a chronic neurological disorder characterized by moderate to severe headaches, and nausea. It is about three times more common in women than in men. The word derives from the Greek ἡμικρανία (hemikrania), "pain on one side of the head", from ἡμι- (hemi-), "half", and κρανίον (kranion), "skull".
The typical migraine headache is unilateral (affecting one half of the head) and pulsating in nature and lasting from two to 72 hours; symptoms include nausea, vomiting, photophobia (increased sensitivity to light) and phonophobia (increased sensitivity to sound); the symptoms are generally aggravated by routine activity. Approximately one-third of people who suffer from migraine headaches perceive an aura—transient visual, sensory, language, or motor disturbances signaling the migraine will soon occur.
Initial treatment is with analgesics for the headache, an antiemetic for the nausea, and the avoidance of triggers. The cause of migraine headache is unknown; the most supported theory is that it is related to hyperexcitability of the cerebral cortex and/or abnormal control of pain neurons in the trigeminal nucleus of the brainstem.
Studies of twins indicate a 60- to 65-percent genetic influence upon their propensity to develop migraine headaches. Moreover, fluctuating hormone levels indicate a migraine relation: 75 percent of adult patients are women, although migraine affects approximately equal numbers of prepubescent boys and girls. Propensity to migraine headache sometimes disappears during pregnancy, but in some women, migraines may become more frequent.
This text uses material from Wikipedia licensed under CC BY-SA
