Archive for the ‘meditation’ Category

Getting Rid of Migraines

Sunday, November 30th, 2008

Raja said over-the-counter drugs can mitigate the severity of the migraine, but they don’t work for everybody. Avoiding triggers is another way to pre-empt migraines.

But when over-the-counter drugs don’t work, and the first line of prescription medications fail, severe migraine sufferers might need narcotic painkillers to ease the symptoms, she said.

The NHF breaks down treatment into two kinds - acute treatments, designed to stop migraines in progress; and prophylactic treatments, medications designed to reduce their likelihood or impact.

Raja said studies have shown that certain blood pressure medications, anti-depressants and seizure medications are effective against migraines and that it’s common practice for doctors to prescribe these drugs for such a use.

The NHF adds to that list drugs used to treat epilepsy and Alzheimer’s disease.

Other new treatments, according to the NHF, include a battery-operated skin patch that allows migraine drugs to be absorbed into the body. There are also many treatments that don’t involve drugs, such as acupuncture and relaxation techniques, Raja said.

Cayenne-pepper “soup,” a totally made-up home remedy of chicken broth with a heavy dousing of cayenne pepper (an idea my mother’s late cousin came up with) has worked during some of my migraines. In fact, the NHF mentioned the use of the capsaicin from cayenne pepper in a nasal spray as one of the latest forms of treatment available for migraines.

I am not endorsing the use of cayenne-laced chicken broth as effective treatment, but I do find solace knowing that there’s medical help out there when I need it. No more sequestering myself to a dark, quiet place for four hours, waiting for the pain and nausea to go away.

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Sore Throat Headache Stress Prevention

Saturday, November 22nd, 2008

The following healthy habits can lessen stress and reduce your chance of getting headaches:

* Getting adequate sleep
* Eating a healthy diet
* Exercising regularly
* Stretching your neck and upper body, especially if your work involves typing or using a computer
* Learning proper posture
* Quitting smoking
* Learning to relax using meditation, deep breathing, yoga, or other techniques
* Wearing proper eyeglasses, if needed

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Tension Headaches Other Treatment

Tuesday, September 9th, 2008

While you may use medicine to treat or prevent tension headaches, adding stress management therapies may help reduce the frequency of your tension headaches. Talk to your doctor about trying:

* Biofeedback, a relaxation method to help you learn to control a body function that is not normally under conscious control, such as muscle tension.
* A relaxation exercise during which you focus on relaxing each muscle group. Relaxation exercises can help with tension headaches. When relaxation exercises and antidepressants are used together as treatment, the results are even better.3
* Acupuncture, which involves putting very thin needles into the skin at certain points on the body to produce energy flow along the body’s meridians. Evidence specifically for tension headaches shows that acupuncture is no better than sham acupuncture (when needles are put into the skin, but not at the right points).4
* Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS), which may help reduce pain.
* Cognitive-behavioral therapy or problem-solving therapy during counseling sessions. Cognitive-behavioral therapy and problem-solving therapy can help with tension headaches. When cognitive-behavioral therapy or problem-solving therapy and antidepressants are used together as treatment, the results are even better.3
* Yoga.
* Meditation.
* Peppermint oil. There is some evidence that peppermint oil rubbed on the temples or on the tight muscles in the head, neck, and shoulders may help relieve tension headaches.

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Best Way To Manage a Headache

Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008

Combining stress management therapies with drugs can be an effective way to manage most headaches, including migraines or tension headaches. People react differently to various drugs and stress management therapies. Finding the right combination may help you prevent and manage your headaches.

Medicines to treat frequent or severe headaches include pain relievers (both prescription and nonprescription) as well as antidepressants, seizure medicines, or beta-blockers. Educating yourself on the type of headache you have and best treatment for it can help you manage your headaches.

You may be able to reduce headache symptoms with stress management and nonmedication therapy alone, although you may need drugs if the symptoms get worse. Stress management and nonmedication therapies to help prevent and reduce the severity of headaches include:

* Biofeedback, a relaxation method to help you learn to control a body function that is not normally under conscious control, such as muscle tension.
* A relaxation exercise during which you focus on relaxing each muscle group. Relaxation exercises can help with tension headaches. When relaxation exercises and antidepressants are used together as treatment, the results are even better.
* Acupuncture, which involves putting very thin needles into the skin at certain points on the body to produce energy flow along the body’s meridians. Evidence specifically for tension headaches shows that acupuncture is no better than sham acupuncture (when needles are put into the skin, but not at the right points).
* Transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation (TENS), which may help reduce pain.
* Cognitive-behavioral therapy or problem-solving therapy during counseling sessions. Cognitive-behavioral therapy and problem-solving therapy can help with tension headaches. When cognitive-behavioral therapy or problem-solving therapy and antidepressants are used together as treatment, the results are even better.
* Yoga.
* Meditation.

Professional counseling can also help reduce stress, anxiety, and symptoms of depression.

Why should you quickly manage your headache?

Early treatment is important because it may prevent headache symptoms from getting worse and help you feel better sooner. You will miss less work or school, and improve the quality of your life.

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Rebound Headaches Prevention

Saturday, June 28th, 2008

Taking good care of yourself can help prevent most types of headaches.

* Avoid headache triggers. If you’re not sure what triggers your headaches, keep a headache diary. Include details about every headache. When did it start? What were you doing at the time? What did you eat that day? How did you sleep the night before? What’s your stress level? How long did it last? What, if anything, provided relief? Eventually, you may begin to see a pattern — and take steps to prevent future headaches.
* Get enough sleep. Go to bed and wake up at the same time every day — even on weekends. If you’re not tired at bedtime, don’t fight it. Read or watch television until you become drowsy and fall asleep naturally.
* Don’t skip meals. Start your day with a healthy breakfast. Eat lunch and dinner at about the same time every day.
* Exercise regularly. Physical activity causes your body to release chemicals that block pain signals to your brain. With your doctor’s OK, choose activities you enjoy — such as walking, swimming or cycling. To avoid injury, start slowly.
* Reduce stress. Get organized. Simplify your schedule. Plan ahead. When the going gets tough, stay positive.
* Relax. Try yoga, meditation or relaxation exercises. Set aside time to slow down. Listen to music, read a book or take a hot bath.
* Quit smoking. If you smoke, talk to your doctor about quitting. Smoking can trigger headaches or make them worse.

Complementary and alternative medicine

For many people, complementary or alternative therapies offer welcome relief from headache pain. It’s important to be cautious, however. Not all complementary or alternative therapies have been studied as headache treatments, and others need further research.

* Acupuncture. This ancient technique uses hair-thin needles to promote the release of natural painkillers and other chemicals in the central nervous system. There is some evidence that it can help control headaches and other conditions that cause chronic pain.
* Hypnosis. During a hypnosis session, a trained hypnotist might suggest ways to decrease your perception of pain and increase your ability to cope with it — such as visualizing a calm, safe place when a headache strikes.
* Meditation. During meditation, you focus on a simple activity, such as breathing or repeating a single word or phrase. The practice creates a deeply restful state in which your breathing slows and your muscles relax — which can help you manage pain and reduce the stress that can trigger or worsen a headache.
* Massage. Massage can reduce stress, relieve tension and promote relaxation. Although its value as a headache treatment hasn’t been fully determined, massage may be particularly helpful if you have tight, tender muscles in the back of your head, neck and shoulders.
* Herbs, vitamins and minerals. Some dietary supplements — including magnesium, feverfew and butterbur — seem to help prevent or treat some types of headaches, but there’s little scientific support for these claims. And ongoing challenges in regards to quality of supplements in the United States makes decisions about using herbs even more complicated. If you’re considering using supplements to treat headaches, check with your doctor. Some supplements may interfere with the effectiveness of prescription or over-the-counter drugs or have other harmful effects.
* Chiropractic care. Spinal manipulation can effectively treat some types of pain, but studies don’t support claims that chiropractic care relieves headaches. Chiropractic manipulation of the neck has been associated with injury to the blood vessels supplying the brain. Rarely, this may cause a stroke.

If you’d like to try a complementary or alternative therapy, discuss the risks and benefits with your doctor.

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Chronic Daily Headaches Coping skills

Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

Chronic daily headaches can interfere with your job, your relationships and your quality of life. But you can cope with the challenges.

* Take control. Commit yourself to living a full, satisfying life. Work with your doctor to develop a treatment plan that works for you. Take good care of yourself. Do things that lift your spirits. Set aside time for your loved ones — and yourself — every day.
* Seek understanding. Don’t expect friends and loved ones to instinctively know what’s best for you. Ask for what you need, whether it’s time alone or less attention focused on your headaches.
* Check out support groups. When your head is throbbing, companionship may be the last thing on your mind — but perhaps it’s just what you need. A support group can put you face to face with people who share your physical symptoms and emotional responses. You may learn useful coping strategies — or help others by sharing some of your own.
* Consider counseling. A counselor or therapist can help you manage stress and maintain your emotional balance. Through therapy, you can learn to change behavior that’s not good for you and reinforce behavior that’s helping you manage your headaches.

Complementary and alternative therapies

For many people, complementary or alternative therapies offer welcome relief from headache pain. It’s important to be cautious, however. Not all complementary or alternative therapies have been studied as headache treatments, and others need further research.

* Acupuncture. This ancient technique uses hair-thin needles to promote the release of natural painkillers and other chemicals in the central nervous system. There is some evidence that it can help control headaches and other conditions that cause chronic pain.
* Biofeedback. With this relaxation technique, you can learn to control headaches by producing changes in bodily responses such as muscle tension, heart rate and skin temperature.
* Meditation. During meditation, you focus on a simple activity, such as breathing or repeating a single word or phrase. The practice creates a deeply restful state in which your breathing slows and your muscles relax — which can help you manage pain and reduce the stress that can trigger or worsen a headache.
* Massage. Massage can reduce stress, relieve tension and promote relaxation. Although its value as a headache treatment hasn’t been determined, massage may be particularly helpful if you have tight, tender muscles in the back of your head, neck and shoulders.
* Herbs, vitamins and minerals. Some dietary supplements — including magnesium, feverfew and butterbur — seem to help prevent or relieve some types of headaches, but there’s only modest scientific support for these claims. If you’re considering using supplements to treat headaches, check with your doctor. Some supplements may interfere with the effectiveness of prescription or over-the-counter drugs or have other harmful effects.
* Chiropractic care. Spinal manipulation can effectively treat some types of pain, but studies don’t support claims that chiropractic care relieves headaches. Chiropractic manipulation of the neck has been associated with injury to the blood vessels supplying the brain. Rarely, this may cause a stroke.

If you’d like to try a complementary or alternative therapy, discuss the risks and benefits with your doctor.

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Migraine Complementary and Alternative Medicine

Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008

Nontraditional therapies may be helpful if you have chronic headache pain:

* Acupuncture. In this treatment, a practitioner inserts many thin, disposable needles into several areas of your skin. The penetration is so shallow and the needles are so thin that acupuncture generally causes little or no pain or discomfort. A number of clinical trials have found acupuncture may be helpful for headache pain, but evidence from these trials isn’t strong enough for experts to routinely recommend this treatment.
* Biofeedback. Biofeedback appears to be especially effective in relieving migraine pain. This relaxation technique uses special equipment to teach you how to monitor and control certain physical responses, such as muscle tension. This technique can be combined with preventive medications.
* Massage. Although massage is a wonderful way to reduce stress and relieve tension, its value in treating headaches hasn’t been fully determined. For people who have tight, tender muscles in the back of the head, neck and shoulders, massage may help relieve headache pain.
* Herbs, vitamins and minerals. There is some evidence that the herbs feverfew and butterbur may prevent migraines or reduce their severity. A high dose of riboflavin (vitamin B-2) also may prevent migraines by correcting tiny deficiencies in the brain cells. There is also some evidence that coenzyme Q10 supplements may be helpful in some individuals. Oral magnesium sulfate supplements may reduce the frequency of headaches in some people, although studies don’t all agree on this issue. In addition, infusions of magnesium sulfate seem to help some people during an acute headache, and they seem to relieve migraine pain in people with magnesium deficiencies. Ask your doctor if these treatments are right for you. Don’t use feverfew or butterbur if you’re pregnant.
* Cervical manipulation. There are no scientifically valid studies that prove that chiropractic or other spine-manipulation treatments are effective in the treatment of migraine.

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Beat Tension Headache

Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

A tension headache is precisely what it sounds like: Headache brought on by stress and tension.

Sleeplessness, stress, improper diet, reading for a long time and working in front of a computer for long hours can precipitate a tension headache, which is the most common type of headache.

One might feel relieved after taking a pill (Panadol, aspirin, etc) but the headache will recur when the effect of the drug wears off. This can be prevented through relaxation techniques, proper diet and practising certain yogic postures.

Postures can release tension in the neck and shoulders, increase blood circulation to the head, stimulate the nervous system and help alleviate the pain.

Yogic breathing exercises like Bhramri Pranayam can calm the mind, reduce stress and alleviate anxiety.

Try this technique for 10 or 20 minutes.

* Sit comfortably by loosening your clothing
* Close your eyes
* Take a few minutes to relax, breathing in and out in slow, deep breaths
* Start by relaxing the muscles of the feet. Focus on the tension flowing away and the way your foot feels as it becomes limp and loose. Hold for a count of 10
* Move slowly up through your body – legs, abdomen, back, neck and face – contracting and relaxing the muscle groups as you go.

A balanced diet can also be crucial in preventing or treating headaches.

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Headache Avoidance

Friday, February 1st, 2008

Since I started my in vitro cycle, and subsequently after I found out I was pregnant, I had been advised not to take any medications, including over-the-counter drugs like Excedrin or Alleve. Unfortunately, I am prone to tension headaches and occasionally get a particularly bad migraine. On Saturday afternoon, I felt a tension headache coming on. Knowing that I would not be able to to turn to drugs as a remedy, I decided to try stretching.

Instant ReliefI bought the book, Instant Relief: Tell Me Where it Hurts and I’ll Tell You What to Do months ago, but it’s been sitting on my shelf, collecting dust. The premise of this book is that by stretching the proper muscles, you can effectively reduce or eliminate your pain. I thought it was worth a try, so I dusted off the book and began doing the stretches recommended for tight neck and shoulder muscles.

After about 10 minutes, I felt significantly better, and avoided a tension headache that could have kept me from dinner with friends.

Perhaps I should keep that book on my nightstand and practice the stretches daily. If it can keep my muscles loose, maybe I can avoid migraines altogether. That would be wonderful.

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Tension Headache Prescription Pills

Saturday, January 12th, 2008

Background: The International Headache Society (IHS) began developing a classification system for headaches in 1985. Finalized in 1988, this system includes a tension-type headache category, further defined as either episodic or chronic. Headache categories also are defined by whether they are associated with pericranial muscle disorders.

Episodic tension headache usually is associated with a stressful event. This headache type is of moderate intensity, self-limited, and usually responsive to nonprescription drugs.

Chronic tension headache often recurs daily and is associated with contracted muscles of the neck and scalp. This type of headache is bilateral and usually occipitofrontal.

Tension-type headache is the most common type of chronic recurring head pain. In the past, pain etiology was presumed to be the muscular contraction of pain-sensitive structures of the cranium, but the IHS intentionally abandoned the terms muscular contraction headache and tension headache because no research supports muscular contraction as the sole pain etiology.

Pathophysiology: Both muscular and psychogenic factors are believed to be associated with tension-type headache.

Frequency:

* In the US: Headache is the ninth most common reason for a patient to consult a physician. Physicians classify 90% of headaches reported to them as muscle contraction or migraine headaches.

* Internationally: No literature suggests that headache frequency is different in other regions of the world.

Sex: A female preponderance exists.

Age: All ages are susceptible, but most patients are young adults.

* Approximately 60% of headache onset occurs in those older than 20 years.
* Headache onset is unusual in those older than 50 years.
* In elderly patients, the practicing physician should never assume that headache onset is due to benign causes, such as tension-type headaches, until pathologic etiologies are explored.

History: Pain onset in tension-type headache can have a throbbing quality and is usually more gradual than onset in migraines. Compared with migraines, tension-type headaches are more variable in duration, more constant in quality, and less severe.

* IHS diagnostic criteria for tension-type headaches states that 2 of the following characteristics must be present:

o Pressing or tightening (nonpulsatile quality)
o Frontal-occipital location
o Bilateral - Mild/moderate intensity
o Not aggravated by physical activity

* Tension-type headache history is as follows:

o Duration of 30 minutes to 7 days
o No nausea or vomiting (anorexia may occur)
o Photophobia and/or phonophobia
o Minimum of 10 previous headache episodes; fewer than 180 days per year with headache to be considered “infrequent”
o Bilateral and occipitonuchal or bifrontal pain
o Pain described as “fullness,” “tightness/squeezing,” “pressure,” or “bandlike/viselike”
o May occur acutely under emotional distress or intense worry
o Insomnia
o Often present upon rising or shortly thereafter
o Muscular tightness or stiffness in neck, occipital, and frontal regions
o Duration of more than 5 years in 75% of patients with chronic headaches
o Difficulty concentrating
o No prodrome

* New headache onset in elderly patients should suggest etiologies other than tension headache.

Physical: The physical examination serves mainly to exclude the possibility of other headache causes.

* Vital signs should be normal.
* Normal neurologic examination
* Tenderness may be elicited in the scalp or neck, but no other positive physical exam findings should be noted.
* Pain should not be elicited over temporal arteries or positive trigger zones.
* Some patients with occipital tension headaches may be very tender when upper cervical muscles are palpated.
* Pain associated with neck flexion and stretching of paracervical muscles must be distinguished from nuchal rigidity associated with meningeal irritation.

Causes: Stress may cause contraction of neck and scalp muscles, although no evidence confirms that the origin of pain is sustained muscle contraction.

* Stress and/or anxiety
* Poor posture
* Depression

Lab Studies:

* Laboratory work should be unremarkable in cases of tension-type headache. Specific tests should be obtained if the history or physical examination suggests another diagnostic possibility.

* Head CT scan or MRI is necessary only when the headache pattern has changed recently or neurologic examination reveals abnormal findings. Such history or physical exam evidence would suggest an alternate cause of headache.

Prehospital Care: Most patients with severe headache should not receive opiate analgesics until the responsible physician can complete an appropriate history and neurologic examination.

Emergency Department Care:

* Ascertain that the patient is not overusing medication, shows no evidence of drug dependency, and is not depressed.

* If headache cause includes dental pathology, sinus disease, trigger points, or CNS pathology, initiate care to treat the specific cause.

While the emergency physician must be able to identify patients with serious headache etiology, more than 90% of patients in the ED have migraine, tension, or mixed-type benign headache. Therefore, providing symptomatic relief should be a priority.

Various modalities are used in the treatment of tension headaches. These include hot or cold packs, ultrasound, electrical stimulation, improvement of posture, trigger point injections, and occipital nerve blocks.

Regular exercise, stretching, balanced meals, and adequate sleep may be part of a headache treatment program.

Further Outpatient Care:

* Physical therapy for patients with headache includes warm and cold packs, ultrasound, and electrical stimulation.
* Regular exercise, stretching, balanced meals, and adequate sleep are part of a headache prevention program.
* Trigger point injections, occipital nerve blocks, or changes that improve posture may be used.

Deterrence/Prevention:

* Physical therapy
* Biofeedback and relaxation therapy
* Cervical traction
* Injection of trigger points

Complications:

* Undue reliance on nonprescription caffeine-containing analgesics
* Dependence on/addiction to narcotic analgesics
* GI bleed from use of NSAIDs
* Risk of epilepsy 4 times greater than that of the general population

Prognosis:

* Headache may become chronic if life stressors are not changed.
* Most cases are intermittent and do not interfere with work or normal life span.

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