You may for example suffer from migraines or someone you know might suffer from migraines. You could have recently had a member of your family diagnosed as suffering from migraines or you could simply be a student researching a paper about migraines. No matter why you are looking into the topic of migraine headaches there is plenty of information available on the subject.

Migraine is a medical disorder known as a neurological syndrome and its principle characteristics in most sufferers are normally very painful headaches and nausea. It is also interesting to note that this relatively common condition afflicts women much more that it does men.

The pain from the migraine is frequently experienced on one side of the head and can be described as throbbing or pulsating in nature. Migraines will normally last anything from 4 to 72 hours and may be anywhere from moderate to severe in intensity. There can also be other additional symptoms such as vomiting or sensitivity to sound or light.

Another fascinating feature of some migraine headaches is the presence of an “aura” in at least thirty percent of people suffering from migraine. The aura occurs before the onset of the migraine and may include things like the appearance of bright lights, zigzag lines or distorted shapes in various sizes and colors which appear in the line of vision. Your field of vision may also reduce and can appear like tunnel vision or maybe a curtain-like effect often over one eye or dark spots that slowly spread.

There might be auditory effects like hearing voices or environmental sounds such as buzzing. You might experience weird smells or feelings of tingling on one side of the face or arms and legs. You could experience a feeling of being separated from your body or a feeling that your arms and legs are moving independently from the body. You may experience anxiety or fear alongside the aura or an unsteadiness or weakness. From time to time people who experience an aura cannot comprehend words that are spoken to them and they may become extremely tired and feel a particular warmth throughout their body.

Apart from migraines accompanied by an aura there are several other ways of describing migraines.

For example, familial hemiplegic migraines (FHM) are those migraines which are caused by ion channel mutations. People who have this form of migraine typically experience limb weakness on one side of the body and vision or speech problems.

Yet another form of migraine is the abdominal migraine in which children have the symptoms of a migraine headache except for the head pain. Symptoms such as nausea, abdominal pain and vomiting can last anywhere from 1 hour to 72 hours.

Finally, menstrual and acephalgic migraines are two other reasonably common types of migraine. Acephalgic migraines are those in which the individual as a rule experiences an aura but does not experience a headache. Menstrual migraines are either menstrual related migraines (MRM) or pure menstrual migraines (PMM). Menstrual related migraines are moderate to severe in terms of pain and occur about the time of the monthly period and at other times as well. Pure menstrual migraines occur only at about the same time as the woman’s monthly period.

Migraines are a very real problem for a lot of people but happily there is a great deal of information available nowadays on everything from the symptoms of migraine to migraine medicine

Migraines are reasonably common and affect about 10% of the population of America, or over 28 million Americans. They are also much more commonly experienced by women rather than men (about 3 times as many women suffer from migraines) and can also be found occasionally in children.

Although migraines are so common and generally very painful with attacks lasting anywhere from a matter of hours to two or three days, only roughly half of all sufferers consult their physician and the rest choose to suffer in silence.

Migraines had long been thought to be were the result of a of dilation of the blood vessels in the head but, despite the fact that there is no general consensus, medical opinion seems to be moving away from this theory in favor of a genetic cause for this problem. It is now believed that migraine headaches are produced by the interaction of certain brain chemicals such as serotonin with the nerve cells. At this point in time however the truth of the matter is that we are really not sure what cause a migraine headache.

In fact there are two different forms of migraine, the first of which is called ‘classical migraine’and is characterized by an accompanying ‘aura’. In this case the term ‘aura’ is used to refer to visual light effects which are experienced immediately prior to the arrival of a headache including such things as flashing lights and bright light spots. In some cases a total loss of vision can be experienced for several minutes before the onset of the headache.

The second type of migraine is a migraine with no prior symptoms of an ‘aura’.

Just as we do not know what causes a migraine headache, we also have very little idea about exactly what gives rise to an attack, although there are some factors which do appear likely to trigger an attack. For example, getting too much sleep seems to be one factor, as does missing meals or eating particular foods like cheese.

Hormones are also believed to influence both the onset of attacks and their severity and one piece of evidence for this is the increased incidence of migraines among women. This in part is thought to be because of the effect of estrogen on the blood vessels and it has been noted in some studies that there is a link between the contraceptive pill (which contains estrogen) and migraine headaches.

Just to confuse matters however studies have also demonstrated that simple everyday activities like climbing a flight of stairs can trigger an attack, as can exposure to loud noises, cold and heat, flashing lights and even stress.

Fortunately, there are a number of migraine medications available today, although no one treatment is really effective in all cases. One thing which we do know though is that over-the-counter medicines are seldom effective and, if you suffer from migraine headaches, you are best advised to seek the help of your physician in finding an answer that works for you.

A cluster headache often presents as what most sufferers describe as a hot and stabbing pain behind only one eye or in the area of the temple. Their chief characteristic however is that they run to a timetable and will appear at about the same time every day often for several days, or even weeks or months at a time. They also tend to appear without warning, unlike migraines which are often preceded by several different warning signs.

Noone is exactly sure what causes these particularly painful headaches though research tends to favor the theory that they are the result of abnormalities in the hypothalamus. The hypothalamus is a small gland which has an important part to play in regulating your body’s internal clock and this may explain why these headaches occur at roughly the same time each day.

Yet another feature of cluster headaches that distinguishes them from migraines is that are seen far more in men than in women. When it comes to migraines some three times as many women as men are afflicted but, with cluster headaches, studies show that they are seen up to eight times more often in men.

Standard treatments for normal headaches are almost always ineffective for cluster headaches and this is one sort of headache for which you need to seek advice from your physician.

One commonly used treatment is to breathe pure oxygen for a few minutes once the headache starts. This particular form of treatment does not work for everybody but usually works very well for those who do find that it helps. It cannot however be used to prevent a headache and only works in treating a headache once it has started.

Yet another very effective treatment is that of using a new class of drugs known as triptans which are presently being used for the treatment of migraine headaches. These drugs do however have to be taken in a fast acting form to be effective and this normally means using them as a nasal spray. However, in many cases cluster headaches can also cause inflammation of the nasal passages making this type of treatment difficult. When this happens, triptans can often be administered by way of aninjection.

At the moment there are no terribly effective preventative treatments available for cluster headaches though some sufferers find that calcium channel blockers work quite well. Additionally, in the most severe cases surgery might be considered as a treatment of last resort and several neurological procedures are available including procedures which block certain nerves and that remove a section of the brain.

Migraines for instance affect approximately 10% of Americans (roughly twenty-eight million people) and afflict three times more women than men. And yet, although such a large section of the population suffers regularly from migraines, we still have little idea about just what causes them. There are of course several theories, the latest of which holds that they are caused by the interaction of chemicals within the brain like serotonin and the nerve cells of the brain, however we do not know for for certain whether or not this is the cause.

Cluster headaches, which are much rarer but also much more intense than migraine headaches, affect about one person in every three hundred and tend to afflict men far more than women. Once again however we only have a provisional idea about what leads to the stabbing pain that is frequently felt behind one eye in these especially painful headaches. A few people think that the cause could be a defect in the hypothalamus but, at this time, there is no sound evidence in support of this theory.

The most common type of headache is what we usually call ordinary or tension-type headaches and once again these are only partly understood. Here the list of possible causes is extremely long indeed and includes everything from the food we eat to the amount of stress we are under. Trying to isolate a specific cause has however as yet proved too difficult and exactly what produces the ordinary everyday headache is still a mystery.

Perhaps the only saving grace is that we do have a large number of medicines available to cope with the different forms of headache and most of these are safe and effective for most sufferers.

Migraine headaches have proved hard to treat for a long time and the ergot drugs once used to treat them had varying degrees of success. These were then replaced by triptans which proved to be more effective but which regrettably had several disadvantages. Now however a new generation of triptan drugs are proving to be safe, show fewer side effects and are effective for most sufferers.

We have also seen an increase in the use of preventive medicines for migraine headaches like calcium channel blockers, beta blockers, anti-seizure medications, anti-depressants and various other drugs which are commonly used to treat other well known conditions. For many people these medications will indeed stop headaches from occurring at all, while in other people they act to reduce the frequency with which headaches occur.

For everyday headaches traditional over-the-counter drugs like paracetamol and aspirin (which have been with us for over 100 years) and newer drugs such as ibuprofen offer safe and effective relief in the majority of cases. For people suffering from frequent headaches though care has to be taken as even the humble aspirin can have side effects if taken too frequently.

Even though there is still so much that we do not know about what causes headaches the simple fact that we can treat them effectively is a comfort to the many sufferers and especially to the large number of people who are afflicted by often very incapacitating migraine headaches. Surprisingly enough though only about half of all those who suffer from migraine headaches ever seek medical advice so that there are millions of individuals today who are needlessly suffering in silence.

If you are bothered by headaches and find that over-the-counter medicines like paracetamol or aspirin do not do the trick then, rather than sit and suffer in silence, drop in and see your physician who will almost certainly be able to help.