TeethRemoval.com

Headache and Pain Infographic: All About Headaches

Posted on 18. Jan, 2012 by wisdom.

Here is an interesting infographic on headaches from the Mount Sinai Medical Center.

The infographic offers statistics on those who suffer from headaches and also offers some remedies to help cure your headache and ease the pain.

Continue Reading

Surgical Treatment of Migraine Headaches

Posted on 04. Jul, 2011 by wisdom.

A study published in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery shows that trigger site surgery may aid in reducing or even eliminating migraine headaches.

100 patients in a study underwent injection of botulinum toxin A (Botox) into up to 4 potential trigger sites. If a trigger site was identified to be effective than surgery was performed in that trigger area in order to decompress nerves and remove muscles.

71 of 79 patients that were evaluated over a 5 year period were observed to have improvement. This meant they had less mean migraine intensity and or less mean migraine duration.

20 of 69 patients (29.0%) reported elimination of migraines and 41 of 69 patients (59.4%) experience a significant decrease.

Surgery is not without risk and neither is injection of botulinum toxin A.  2 patients had hypersensitivity, 2 patients had hyposensitivity, and 2 patients had numbess at their 5 year follow up. This complications occured in the front region. 1 patient had occasional neck stiffness and 2 patients had occasional neck weakness which occurred in the occipital region.

I know from firsthand experience after having an occipital nerve block in attempt to end my 24/7 headache brought on by removing my wisdom teeth that injections into nerve and muscle areas in an effort to reduce headache can just make things worse as also indicated by this study. ( I discuss this more on http://www.teethremoval.com/occipital_nerve_block.html)

Therefore, anyone suffering from any headache condition should of course proceed with caution before having any injection and/or surgical procedure performed.  There are many different types of headache and jumping into any procedure that can just make pain and suffering worse is not well indicated. Even so an injection and/or surgical procedure can aid in helping those who suffer from migraine.

Due to the design protocol of this study there is no way to tell if the botulinum toxin A injection alone would produce similar results to it and the surgery.

Reference: Bahman Guyuron, Jennifer S. Kriegler, Janine Davis, Saeid B. Amini. Five Year Outcome of Surgical Treatment of Migraine Headaches. Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. vol. 127. no. 2. 2010.

Continue Reading

Headaches in Teens Tied to Obesity, Smoking, and Lack of Exercise

Posted on 17. Feb, 2011 by wisdom.

These findings certainly come as no surprise. Teenagers who are overweight, get little exercise, or who smoke may be more likely to have frequent headaches and migraines when compared to teens who do not have these characteristics.

Teens with all three of the previously described negative lifestyle factors were 3.4 times more likely to have frequent headaches than those with none of those factors.

Fifty five percent of those teens with all three of these negative lifestyle factors have frequent headaches where as 25% of teens without any of these factors have frequent headaches. Another result of the study was that those with two negative lifestyle factors were 1.8 times more likely to have frequent headaches.

Looking individually at the negative lifestyle factors: smoking teens have headaches 50% more frequently, overweight teens have headaches 40% more frequently and teens who exercise less than twice a week have headaches 20% more frequently.

These results were based on the data provided by the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study where 5,847 students age 13 to 18 in Nord-Trøndelag county in Norway were interviewed by nurses about headaches and their weight and height measurements were taken. They also completed a questionnaire about physical activity and smoking.  In addition 36% of girls and 21%o f boys from the study reported having recurrent headaches within the last year.

Source: Andrew D. Hershey, Richard B. Lipton. Lifestyles of the young and migrainous. Neurology, 2010.

Continue Reading

Needles and Their Effects on Headaches

Posted on 30. May, 2009 by wisdom.

Two separate systematic reviews by Cochrane Researchers show  acupuncture is  for prevention of headaches and migraines. However the reviews show  faked procedures, where needles are incorrectly inserted, may be as effective.

“Much of the clinical benefit of acupuncture might be due to non-specific needling effects and powerful placebo effects, meaning selection of specific needle points may be less important than many practitioners have traditionally argued,” says lead researcher of both studies, Klaus Linde.

Two seperate studies were done one with migraine and the other with tension type headaches. Patients treated with acupuncture over an 8 week time course, suffered fewer headaches compared to those who were given only pain killers. In the migraine study, acupuncture was superior to proven prophylactic drug treatments, but faked treatments were no less effective. In the tension headache study, true acupuncture was actually slightly more effective than faked treatments.

The results indicate that acupuncture could be used as an alternative for those patients who prefer not to use drug treatments, and additionally may result in fewer side effects. Even so some people will have mixed results and may or may not see an improvement. For me personally, I noticed worsening with acupuncture treatment due to the needles.

This article is adapated from ScienceDaily.

Continue Reading

Headache After Brain Injury

Posted on 20. May, 2009 by wisdom.

U.S. soldiers who have been in Iraq are returning to the United States with headaches. This is the result of a mild trauma or exposure to a blast. This information was presented at American Academy of Neurology’s 61st Annual Meeting in Seattle.

The study involved nearly 1,000 U.S. Army soldiers returning from Iraq or Afghanistan last year in 2008. All had experienced a concussion, head injury or blast exposure while deployed.

Nearly 98 percent of the soldiers reported having headaches during the last three months of their deployment. The headaches started within one week of the traumatic brain injury for 37 percent of the soldiers, and within one to four weeks for 20 percent. Among the soldiers whose headaches started within a week of the injury, 60 percent had migraine-like headaches and 40 percent had headaches that interfered with their ability to do their daily activities. Thirty percent had headaches for 15 or more days each month.

“Mild traumatic brain injury is occurring in 15 to 25 percent of soldiers deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan…The associated headaches can be a source of impaired occupational functioning. These findings should alert health care providers….”

Adapted from materials provided by American Academy of Neurology.

Continue Reading