Migraine

Lifestyle changes are at least as important as the medications. Very often it is the little things we do that set us up for headaches. In general, migraine sufferers do best when they have a routine. Regular meal times, regular sleep patterns, regular menstrual cycle and regular exercise schedule. Again, there is a lot of variability from person to person, and it is best to discuss your daily and weekly activities with a medical professional skilled in headache management. Very often, modest “tweaking” of lifestyle can result in huge decreases in the frequency and severity of headache.

In most cases, the short answer is yes. It is very unusual to find migraine headaches in someone without any family history of migraine. One very rare form of migraine, called Familial Hemiplegic Migraine has actually be traced to a specific gene, but as yet no gene has been identified for the more common forms of migraine. 

There is a group of people who develop migraine-like headaches after significant head trauma, and they may or may not have a family history. Knowing your family history for headaches (not just whether there is one, but what different family member do for their headaches) is one of the most useful pieces of information you can bring to your physician

• For the vast majority of people, migraine is a genetic disease – it runs in families. It probably represents an overly sensitive response by the brain to changes in the environment (internal or external).
• When a noxious stimulus reaches the trigeminal – it triggers the release of chemicals called vasoactive peptides that create changes in the diameter of blood vessels in the membrane that lines the brain. It also causes changes in the ability of nerves within particular parts of the brain to fire properly. Finally, it causes the brain to become overly sensitive to sensory input
• The third question is an individual one and we don’t know why one person’s headache is triggered by red wine and the next person will have an apparently identical headache from strong perfume but never from red wine. This is an area of intense interest among scientists studying headache.

Yes. Migraine should be suspected when children (of any age) go through bouts of crying and crankiness, possibly with vomiting or diarrhea, that happen repeatedly, last for several hours, then falls asleep and is fine upon awakening. Be especially suspicious if one or both parents or other siblings or close relatives also experience migraine. Typically these children will have been to many specialists looking for stomach and other problems before anyone thinks to consider migraine.

At least with respect to migraines, it is a chronic disease. Prevention means paying attention to the things that seem to bring on or worsen headaches and modifying your lifestyle to avoid or minimize them. Often, prevention will include medication or other modalities such as biofeedback or physical therapy to help control the headaches. There is no secret formula that works for everyone, but everyone can positively affect.