biomarker

A new marker in blood for migraine?

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An interesting article titled “Interictal, circulating sphingolipids in women with episodic migraine: A case-control study” written by B. L. Peterlin and et al. discusses that a new marker in blood may have been found for episodic migraine (Neurology, 2015). Episodic migraine is when a patient has less than 15 headaches per month. The researchers performed a study with 52 women with episodic migraine and 36 women who did not have any headaches. They all had to undergo a neurologic exam, gave blood samples, and had their body mass index measured. The women in the study with migraine had an average of 5.6 headache days per month. The blood samples were tested for a group of lipids that are known to help regulate inflammation in the brain and participate in energy homeostasis. The study found the total levels of lipids called ceramides were decreased in women … Read more

Blood Levels in Fat Cells May Help Predict Migraine

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A new study appearing in the journal Headache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, looks at people experiencing two to twelve migraine headaches a month. In this study researchers found that measuring a fat-derived protein called adiponectin before and after migraine treatment is useful in revealing if headache patients felt pain relief or not. The researchers of the study are hopeful that finding this potential biomarker for migraine of adiponectin may be used for developing new and better migraine treatment options. Finding better treatment options for migraine sufferers is lucrative because roughly 36 million Americans suffer from migraine headaches which can last longer than 4 hours at a time. Women are three times to get migraines when compared to men. In the study the researchers collected blood from 20 women who visited 3 different headache clinics for an acute … Read more