Faster Diagnosis? Hemiplegic Migraine

Researchers at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, USA, want to see children get better treatment faster.

The sooner you get an accurate diagnosis, the sooner you can get effective treatment.  In fact, an early diagnosis may mean the difference between being good treatment and almost no good treatment.

We’ve heard the stories of people diagnosed with migraine, only to discover they had another disease.  Or people diagnosed with a dozen things before finally recognizing they had migraine or some other headache disorder.

In this case, researchers were concerned about hemiplegic migraine.  This type of migraine is characterized by weakness on one side of the body.  Sometimes the patient experiences numbness, tingling, headache, and trouble speaking.

The two main types of hemiplegic migraine are familial and sporadic.  Familial has one advantage – another close relative carries the same genes that are related to the symptoms.

Sporadic hemiplegic migraine (SHM) is, on the other hand, even trickier to diagnose.

A remarkable example of SWI, courtesy of SBarnes

Researchers were checking on the use of susceptibility-weighted imaging (SWI), and MRI technique that can show things that can show remarkable data, particularly related to blood and veins.

In this case, the SWI checked the veins and the “magnetic susceptibility” in the patient.  (Study of magnetism in tissues and blood cells is also a relatively new but growing study)

The researchers combined older MRI techniques with SWI, testing patients during and after an attack.  With a special focus on parts of the brain known to related to hemiplegic migraine symptoms, they were able to see clear changes in things like blood flow and magnetic susceptibility.

This is very cutting edge research, and it may have implications for other types of migraine beyond hemiplegic.  The more we see and understand about a migraine attack, the more we’ll be able to quickly and inexpensively diagnose migraine – and different types of migraine.  And, of course, these things will help us get to a better treatment in the end.

Read more:  The diagnostic role for susceptibility-weighted MRI during sporadic hemiplegic migraine.