According to results of a retrospective study presented at PAINWeek 2017, opioids are not only prescribed to a large proportion of patients diagnosed with headache (H) and/or migraine (M), but are also more commonly used than triptan medications. During the analysis, 547,558 adults with at least two ICD-9-CM or ICD-10-CM diagnostic code claims for H […]
Current treatment for migraines is eclectic by necessity of the mystery of the disease, and includes everything from antidepressants to beta blockers to highly potent painkillers. None of it is entirely effective. It’s hard to treat a disease you don’t understand and current theories as to the elusive cause of this disease fall way short […]
According to a study published in the journal Headache, the use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) for the treatment of migraine and headache is “relatively low” in the U.S. While some CAM products have shown beneficial effects in clinical studies of headache and migraine, “there has been little research exploring the reasons for using CAM, and the types […]
Eli Lilly‘s bid to bring a new class of migraine therapy to market has just been lifted by a second positive trial that sets up first-marketing applications next year. The top-line results of the SPARTAN trial show that oral serotonin 5-HT1F agonist lasmiditan provided relief from the headache pain and other symptoms associated with acute […]
Energy-saving lightbulbs could be giving us all headaches as they flicker too much. LED bulbs can bring on feelings of dizziness and pain within just 20 minutes of switching them on, an expert has warned. Arnold Wilkins, Psychology professor at the University of Essex, said the flickering of the unpopular lights is stronger than for traditional […]
A quest to analyze the unique features of individual human brains evolved into the so-called Midnight Scan Club, a group of scientists who had big ideas but almost no funding and little time to research the trillions of neural connections that activate the body’s most powerful organ. The research group started in 2013 by two […]
An association was established between excessive daytime sleepiness (EDS) and a high frequency of headaches, but not between EDS and chronic migraine or chronic tension-type headache (CTTH). The results were published in Cephalalgia. Espen S. Kristoffersen, PhD from Akershus University Hospital in Norway, and colleagues conducted a cross-sectional survey of 30,000 people age 30 to 44 via […]
Bright lights can worsen headaches, but a new study shows an LED light might do the opposite. Doctors Mohab Ibrahim and Rajesh Khanna of the University of Arizona tested green LED lights and white LED lights on small samples of people with chronic migraines. They found that the pain of the group looking at the […]
It may soon be possible to predict when a future migraine attack might happen. Research published in the journal Headache found they could be forecast by analyzing stress. The study authors have developed a new model based on measuring stress from daily hassles. They believe it may be possible to tell whether it will occur […]
New research shows that patients with migraine who have subclinical hypothyroidism and receive thyroid treatment have significantly fewer and less severe headaches. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study showing that treatment of subclinical hypothyroidism was effective in reducing both the frequency and severity of migraine attacks and improved the quality […]
