A Publication of the East Bay Headache Support Group
A member of the American Council for Headache Education (ACHE) support group network

January 11th Meeting:  Biofeedback Therapy for Prevention/Relief of Headaches

The East Bay Headache Support Group is pleased to welcome back Ellen Place, RN, as its guest speaker for the first meeting in 2005.  Ms. Place has been a biofeedback therapist for more than 20 years.  She has expertise in treating various disorders using biofeedback techniques, and specializes in treating headaches.

If you have ever wondered about biofeedback and if and how this therapy can help to prevent or relieve your headaches, join us for Ellen’s very informative presentation. 

We will meet in the Lesher Auditorium at Mt. Diablo Medical Center in Concord, from 7:30 pm to 9:00 pm on Tuesday, January 11.  Call Leslie Davis at 925-685-8775 for more information.

For the January 11th meeting ONLY, we will meet in the Lesher Auditorium at MT. DIABLO MEDICAL CENTER in Concord, not at John Muir Medical Center.  Mark your calendars!

Address:  2540 East Street, Concord, Phone:  925-682-8200

Directions to Mt. Diablo Medical Center:

From Walnut Creek, take 680 N and merge onto 242 N toward Concord/Pittsburg.  Take the Grant Street exit.  Turn right onto Grant Street, which makes a slight jog to the left and becomes East Street after a few blocks.  The medical center will be on your left.  Go past it and turn left onto Almond Avenue and then into the parking lot.  Enter at main lobby and follow signs to the Lesher Auditorium.

Please refrain from wearing perfume or other strongly scented products to our meetings.  Many headache sufferers are highly sensitive to odors.

Migraine Experience in the Hospital

Recently, I had the experience of being a patient in the hospital for surgery.  I feared having a migraine there, as I know my triggers are not eating and getting enough sleep.  The surgery did not worry me, just the potential for a migraine headache. 

Prior to surgery, I spoke with my doctor about my history of migraines and the medications I take.  It did not occur to me that the hospital pharmacy might not carry the medications I use.  In this case, I use Zomig nasal spray at home, but the hospital pharmacy only carried the Zomig pills.  I tried the pills as my headache came on, but this only led to a full blown migraine with nausea and vomiting.  I did receive medications that eventually stopped the vomiting and headache and allowed me to sleep.

The point I am making is that if you are hospitalized and/or have surgery, it is important to tell your doctor and the hospital nurses about your migraine condition.  Include the anesthesiologist as well, as he/she may be able to give you something in surgery to help with the nausea and vomiting. 

Remember that not all pharmacies carry every single medication on the market.  It is OK to bring and take your own medication in the hospital, as long as the doctor has approved and ordered it in your hospital stay.  Being a patient means that you only take medications that the nurse administers to you.  Never take your own medications without being approved by your admitting doctor.  There are drug interactions with all medications.  The nurse usually will take possession of your medication and send it to the pharmacy to approve it and then it will be available to the nursing staff to dispense when needed.  When you are discharged the medication you brought into the hospital will also go home with you minus the medications you took. 

Some of the hospital staff are not well educated about migraine headaches and do not know the medications as well as we migraineurs do!  Also, it is our job to be our own advocate and to be prepared ahead of time.  I am a registered nurse and also a patient and have seen things from both perspectives.

- Anonymous

Movement Therapy May Aid Chronic Headache, by Amy Norton

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) — A type of movement therapy designed to promote relaxation may help chronic headache sufferers deal with their pain, preliminary research suggests.

The study of 33 adults with frequent tension-type headaches or migraine found that the therapy—known as the Trager approach—appeared to reduce bouts of head pain and help patients cut back on medication.

The Trager method, named for its founder, Dr. Milton Trager, is a mind-body type of movement therapy that aims to reduce the tension that people unconsciously hold in their bodies.  It involves massage-like sessions in which a practitioner certified in the technique gently moves and stretches the muscles and joints to try to relax the body.  Patients are also taught sequences of movements to do at home.

The Trager approach is promoted for treating lower back pain and other musculoskeletal woes, but the new study is the first to evaluate its effectiveness against chronic headache.  The results suggest that the therapy can help relieve the pain of both common tension-type headaches and migraine, according to Dr. Stanley Azen, a professor of preventive medicine at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and the study’s senior author.

The findings, Azen said, lay the groundwork for larger studies that look at the longer-term effects of the Trager approach and how variable the benefits may be with different Trager practitioners—since a single practitioner performed the therapy in this study.

However, a chronic headache sufferer interested in seeking out a certified Trager therapist need not wait for those larger studies, according to Azen.  Since the therapy is so low-risk, he told Reuters Health, it may be worth a try.

Azen and his colleagues report their findings in the journal Alternative Therapies.  The study included adults, mostly women, who had suffered tension-type headaches, migraine attacks or both at least once a week for more than six months.  The patients were randomly assigned either to six weeks of once-a-week Trager sessions, to an “attention” group that met weekly with their doctors to discuss their condition, or to a control group that received no additional therapy beyond medication. 

By the end of the study, Trager patients were reporting fewer headaches per week—about 27 percent fewer, on average—along with a 44 percent reduction in medication use.  Patients in the attention group also showed small declines in headache frequency and medication use, while headache frequency and intensity appeared to worsen in the control group.

According to researchers, the Trager approach may help relieve pain through a general calming effect on the central nervous system.  And although migraine and tension-type headaches are different conditions, the team notes that patients with either type of head pain may have similar “muscle tension patterns,” particularly in the neck and back, that may respond equally well to the Trager technique.♦

SOURCE:  Alternative Therapies, September/October 2004.  Found on the Web site of MedlinePlus: www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus

Getting Control

Editor’s Note:  For the first newsletter of the year, I have included a list of New Year’s Resolutions to consider.  Go to the Web site of Health Square at http://www.healthsquare.com/headaches7a.htm for the complete article.

For Emotional Triggers…

Laugh.

Get short-term or long-term counseling.

Let your family know what triggers your headaches.

Write a letter to someone who has made you angry.  You don’t have to mail it.

Relax.

Investigate biofeedback therapy.

For Dietary Triggers…

Try eliminating from your diet the foods known to trigger headaches.

Keep alcohol to a minimum.

Try magnesium supplements.

For Metabolic Triggers…

Stop overusing substances that cause headaches, like caffeine and certain medications.

If you are using oral contraceptives, and suspect hormones are triggering your headaches, talk to your gynecologist about changing your formulation.

If you suffer from menstrual migraine, you can reduce the effects of falling estrogen levels during your menstrual cycle by using estrogen supplements.

For Daily Activity Triggers…

Maintain consistency in your eating and sleeping patterns.

Stop smoking cigarettes, or at least decrease the number of cigarettes.

Exercise regularly.

Do a workplace analysis.  Is it ergonomically correct?

Take regular breaks from repetitive tasks.

Gently stretch and flex your neck muscles regularly during the day to reduce strain on sensitive nerves. 

Blink, Blink

The next time you feel a migraine coming on, you may find relief just a wink or two away. 

A researcher at Trinity Western University in Langley, British Columbia, has had success in stopping and preventing migraines by using a post-traumatic stress treatment called “One Eye Integration.”

The treatment involves controlling the amount of light that enters the brain through the eyes by alternately covering and exposing each eye.  The method tends to force the migraine sufferer to shift attention from the side of the brain where the pain is located to the side that isn’t hurting.

The majority of subjects involved in the study found relief in a matter of minutes.

For the estimated 31 million North Americans who suffer pain, nausea and other effects due to migraine headaches, the new treatment could be revolutionary, says Kevin Lefebvre, who conducted the study.

More study needs to be done on the treatment, and it’s not clear at this time whether migraine sufferers could be trained to administer it themselves or if they’d need to see a professional. 

SOURCE:  Found in the November 30, 2004 issue of the Contra Costa Times.

Melatonin for Migraines, by Dr. Julian Whitaker

If you count yourself among the 24 million Americans plagued by intense throbbing and often nauseating migraine headaches, you will definitely want to hear this.  Research has shown that melatonin, the natural hormone secreted by the pineal gland that promotes sleep and natural circadian rhythms, can help reduce the frequency and intensity of the bothersome, painful and sometimes debilitating attacks.

In a study published in the September 24, 2004 issue of Neurology, researchers administered 3 mg of melatonin to 32 participants every evening 30 minutes prior to bedtime.  After 3 months of treatment, 78% of the subjects reported that the frequency of their migraines was cut in half.  None reported an increase in headaches.  The study also found that the duration of migraines was shortened with melatonin.

If you want to give this safe, natural therapy a try, I suggest following the study’s guidelines.  Take 3 mg of melatonin 30 minutes before you turn in for the night.  Even if it doesn’t alleviate your migraines, you sleep like a baby. 

SOURCE:  Found in the November 2004 issue of Health and Healing.