Discoveries & Stats

28 August 2009

Migraine: Does your face hurt?

A small study published in June suggested that almost 9% of migraineurs have facial pain during an attack. Now this is of course another of those chicken-and-egg questions, because some of those patients likely have jaw issues that are triggering migraine attacks. But others simply have migraine attacks that cause the facial pain. Read about the study from Germany, Prevalence of facial pain in migraine: a population-based study.

In fact, in rare cases, there is something rare called isolated facial migraine, where the pain in the face is the main feature of the migraine.

Sometimes treatment for the jaw is needed, such as an NTI-tss device. In other cases, when the pain is coming from the migraine attack, simply treating migraine as a whole will solve the facial pain issue as well.

What about you? Do you have facial pain during an attack? What’s it like?

24 August 2009

Vertigo in Children

James Discoveries & Stats, Tips 1

Vertigo in children is a real challenge to diagnose for a number of reasons. First, children often simply don’t realize what’s going on, or they have trouble describing it. Second, vertigo can be a challenge to diagnose anyway, because there are many causes.

One of the major causes is migraine. An article out of Germany recently suggested that migraine may account for 50% of vertigo cases in children. Other causes may be epilepsy, motion sickness, and other diseases and syndromes, even tumours.

To get to the bottom of vertigo in children, it’s important to watch your child carefully and listen to what he/she is saying. Also, make sure your doctor takes the time to understand the medical history of the child. Also, the doctor must take the time to find out about other symptoms – loss of coordination, hearing loss or ringing in the ears, falls, changes in behaviour, and problems with movement patterns.

Vertigo should never be ignored, because it can be a sign of a very serious condition. Catching these conditions, including migraine, early, can be a great help in treatment.

12 August 2009

Migraine, Pregancy and Cardiovascular diseases – more disturbing news

James Discoveries & Stats 2

Research continues to be published about the link between migraine and cardiovascular disease. This one, published in the British Medical Journal, has to do with women who have migraine during pregnancy.

Many women experience a remission of migraine during pregnancy. However, many do not.

The pretty name for it is peripartum migraines, and they can be very difficult to deal with. Although there are many treatments available for these migraine attacks, many women need to change their treatments during pregnancy to protect the baby.

The study found that women with migraine attacks during pregnancy were at a much higher risk of stroke (15 times). There was also 3x the risk of blood clots and double the risk of heart disease.

Now, it’s important to realize that these numbers aren’t quite as scary as they might seem at first. Stroke is very rare in pregnancy, so it’s still going to be rare even among migraineurs.

However, this is important for doctors and patients to know because, if you have other risk factors, this does increase your changes. Information like this can help you make informed decisions about risk when it comes to what medication to take or not take.

Migraine during pregnancy is not something your doctor should just brush off and tell you to deal with. It’s a serious aspect of your pregnancy that you need to take into consideration and deal with – with treatment, not by ignoring it and living with the pain.

More here: Migraines Increase Stroke Risk During Pregnancy

4 August 2009

More studies on Tonabersat

James Discoveries & Stats, Medications 0

A new study has been come out for the upcoming migraine drug, tonabersat. The drug is a gap junction blocker, and researchers are hopeful that it will be specifically helpful for those with migraine with aura.

The new study confirmed this idea. The small but carefully done study showed a reduction of migraine attacks by about 1/3 over a course of 12 weeks for those with migraine with aura for those who took 40mg of tonabersat once daily. When aura wasn’t taken into consideration, tonabersat didn’t perform better than a placebo.

In other words, if you get migraine with aura regularly, this drug may be for you. Otherwise, it doesn’t look like it.

The continuing studies on tonabersat not only help us prepare for which patients will benefit, but also help us understand more about migraine. At the moment, these findings seem to support the theory that migraine with aura has a lot to do with the cortical spreading depression. Migraine without aura seems different somehow.

3 August 2009

Migraine and Cardiovascular Disease – Why?

James Discoveries & Stats 0

We know that migraine patients are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease. But why? In other words, what is happening to the body that is increasing the risk?

A recent study took a step toward answering the question. Published in the June 2009 issue of Neurology, the study of 12 migraineurs came out of Italy.

Basically, the study (Vascular smooth muscle cell dysfunction in patients with migraine.) found a problem with the blood vessels of migraine patients. The blood vessels didn’t react normally to certain stimuli – specifically, they didn’t expand as expected. The researchers came to the conclusion that migraineurs may have "distinct vascular smooth muscle cell dysfunction".

This is important because this type of dysfunction is a major factor when it comes to vascular disease, and a lot of current research is focused on solving this particular issue to treat patients.

This is very important research, because cardiovascular disease is one reason migraine can be deadly.

In the mean time, this is another reminder to us migraineurs to keep our hearts healthy – don’t smoke and avoid second-hand smoke, be active, eat a healthy diet, keep your weight at a healthy level, and avoid illegal drugs. Also, be sure your doctor is aware of your medical history, and don’t take unneccesary risks with the medications you take.