Body–Mind, Self-Care Program:
Everything you do – eat, drink, sleep, move, sit, stand, think, feel, interact – adds up to how you feel and function. In a body-mind program, as with one for diet or exercise, by changing your daily practices, you will get a different result.
Headache Coach Jan Mundo will guide you to wellness and help you overcome your pain. Lessons, accompanied by handouts, individualized coaching, and assessments, include: tracking your triggers, headache-healthy diet, stress relief, and harnessing the power of your body and mind for healing.
The New York Headache Center, located at 30 East 76th Street, New York, NY generously offered its space for this program to be held weekly from March 8 until April 12, 2011, at 6 – 8:15 pm.
For more information see Jan Mundo’s site
Headache coach, Jan Mundo will be conducting classes at the New York Headache Center (this is a second announcement). The course consists of 6 weekly sessions which will be held on Wednesdays from 6 to 8 PM from September 22 through October 27. Jan’s course is “for headache or migraine sufferers who want natural solutions! Learn how to use your body and mind to relieve and prevent your cycles of pain. In a supportive environment: Find your best headache diet, use centering practices to de-stress, learn self-massage to ease pain, practice hands-on headache relief, enlist thoughts, moods, and emotions as allies.” For details and registration go to http://www.mundolifework.com. Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Headache-Coach/72585407316?v=app_2344061033#!/event.php?eid=102475893145453&index=1..
Read MoreHeadache coach, Jan Mundo will be conducting classes at the New York Headache Center. The course consists of 6 weekly sessions which will be held on Wednesdays from 6 to 8 PM from September 22 through October 27. Jan’s course is “for headache or migraine sufferers who want natural solutions! Learn how to use your body and mind to relieve and prevent your cycles of pain. In a supportive environment: Find your best headache diet, use centering practices to de-stress, learn self-massage to ease pain, practice hands-on headache relief, enlist thoughts, moods, and emotions as allies.” For details and registration go to http://www.mundolifework.com.
Read MoreMany migraine sufferers feel that food allergies cause their headaches. There is little dispute that certain foods can trigger migraines. Some of these foods include chocolate, wine, cheese, citrus fruit, onions, smoked, cured, and pickled foods. However, migraine that results from eating these foods is not due to an allergic reaction, but rather is due to a chemical reaction. An allergic reaction occurs when the body’s immune defense mechanisms try to isolate and attack an offending substance, called an allergen. It is possible to evaluate this immune response by measuring blood levels of immune globuline (IgG) which is specific to to a particular food or substance. Since there are so many different foods that we eat, literally hundreds of tests are required. Doing such extensive testing has been controversial, in part because of its high cost. This testing has been advocated for patients with irritable bowel syndrome. People who are found to have high levels of of IgG to certain foods can improve their condition by eliminating those foods. Another way to detect food allergies is by scratch test, where an extract of different foods is placed into skin scratches and then the skin reaction is measured.
A sophisticated study recently published in Cephalalgia by Dr. Ertas and his colleagues looked at food allergies in migraine patients. They tested IgG levels to 266 foods in the blood of 30 migraine sufferers. The number of foods these 30 patients were allergic to ranged from 13 to 35. After testing, for six weeks each patient ate a diet which included or excluded foods they were allergic to. After that, they had two weeks of unrestricted diet, followed by another 6 weeks of the opposite diet (if they first had a diet free of allergen, then they were switched to a diet with allergens, and vice versa). Neither the doctor, nor the patient knew what foods the patient was allergic to or which diet was given in each 6-week period. The results of the study showed that significantly fewer migraines occurred when the diet excluded foods patients were allergic to. This is the first rigorous study which suggests that food allergy testing may find a place in the management of patients with migraine headaches.
Read More74% of girls and 52% of boys have headaches at age 17, according to a Finnish study of 6,262 twins. At age 11, 60% of girls and 59% of boys had headaches at least once a month. The prevalence of weekly headaches increase d in girls from 16% to 25% between ages 11 and 14. Headaches in kids is a major problem, but unfortunately it does not receive proper attention. Sometimes parents do not believe that their child has a headache or if they do, they are reluctant to take the child to a doctor because they don’t want to resort to prescription medications. Fortunately, many non-drug approaches are very effective in kids. Regular sleep schedule (very hard to enforce in teenagers), regular meals, frequent aerobic exercise, biofeedback or meditation, and supplements can be very effective. Several studies have shown that kids with headaches are often deficient in magnesium, riboflavin (vitamin B2), and Co-enzyme Q10 (CoQ10). If a child still has headaches, a medications may also be appropriate.
Read MoreVitamin D deficiency is often found in patients with headaches and neuralgia, which I’ve already mentioned in previous posts. Chronic pain patients with low vitamin D levels were also found to have poor exercise tolerance, making their rehabilitation more difficult. Now, there is strong evidence from two independent studies, which involved over one thousand people, that those with low vitamin D levels were twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease, other types of dementia, and strokes. The researchers and those commenting on this research called for more studies before any recommendations can be made. This response of the medical establishment is typical in its lack of common sense. Yes, there are dangers in taking too much vitamin D, but shouldn’t they call for doctors to test for this deficiency and correct it when it is present? Even if we don’t know exactly if this supplementation will prevent strokes, Alzheimer’s or headaches, it makes sense to keep everyone’s level in the middle of the normal range.
Read MoreAcupuncture increases connections between different areas of the brain, according to Dhond and other Korean researchers who published their findings in the journal Pain. They compared the effect of true and sham acupuncture in healthy volunteers using functional MRI of the brain. They discovered that true acupuncture (insertion of one needle into the forearm) enhanced the “spacial extent of resting brain networks to include anti-nociceptive (pain-relieving), memory, and affective (responsible for emotions) brain regions”. The researchers felt that this enhancement of connections between various parts of the brain is probably responsible for the pain relief induced by acupuncture. After the recent German study of acupuncture for headaches which involved over 15,000 patients there is little doubt that acupuncture works for headaches (and many other pain conditions), but this study helps provide stronger scientific evidence that the relief is not due to placebo.
Read MoreI’ve written in a previous post that people exposed to pleasant music feel less pain than people listening to unpleasant music or to no music at all. Some studies have suggested that happy music (typically music with faster tempo and major mode) is better at relieving pain than sad music. A study by Chinese researchers published earlier this year in the journal Pain showed that both sad and happy melodies lower pain perception in healthy volunteers, as long as the melodies are pleasant. This study adds to the growing evidence that music can indeed relieve pain and, not surprisingly, that the music has to be pleasant.
Read MoreHoliday headaches are quite avoidable, but to avoid them you have to have willpower. I know myself that it is hard to resist all the chocolate that surrounds you during the holidays. If you have a choice, pick milk chocolate over dark. There is no scientific proof, but in my case I find that the higher the cocoa content the more likely I will get a headache. Of course I, like many other chocoholics do not consider milk chocolate real chocolate and don’t bother eating it. For the most part I stay away from chocolate altogether because it is addictive – once you start eating it, it is hard to stop. My headaches do respond to medication and when I do eat chocolate I make sure to have it handy. Another way to avoid headaches from chocolate, or for that matter any other trigger, is to avoid having more than one trigger at a time. That is if you want to have some chocolate do not also drink wine or do not eat chocolate if you did not get enough sleep.
Read MoreDr. Oz : “Like Alexander Mauskop, I believe that magnesium can help—it relaxes arteries and muscles in the body, both of which can help with headaches”. This statement in the latest issue of O, The Oprah Magazine is not very surprising coming from a cardiac surgeon – magnesium is routinely used after open heart surgery. Unfortunately, many neurologist and other physicians treating headaches still do not recommend magnesium for their headache patients. And this is despite all the scientific evidence and despite the recommendation of the American Academy of Neurology. I think this is in part due to their training that emphasizes the use of drugs rather than natural approaches. This bias is reinforced by the strong influence of the pharmaceutical industry.
Read MoreSmoking marijuana and taking its legal medicinal derivative, dronabinol helped one patient with cluster headaches, according to a report from the Montefiore Headache Clinic. Dronabinol is approved for the treatment of nausea and loss of appetite. The effectiveness of smoking marijuana or taking dronabinol for the relief of pain has been reported by many patients, but never proven in large trials. I generally discourage patients trying marijuana for the relief of any symptoms, unless they have tried and failed traditional medications and they have already tried marijuana and it did help. Marijuana not only has many negative effects on the body, but can be also contaminated by other harmful substances. Cluster headaches can be extremely intense and at times lead patients to thoughts of suicide. In view of this report it seems reasonable to try dronabinol in patients who failed Imitrex injections, oxygen and preventive drugs, such as high dose of verapamil, lithium, and topiramate.
Read MorePhysical inactivity was strongly associated with headache disorders, according to a large study by Swedish researchers published in Headache. They looked at 43,770 people with recurrent headaches and migraines and found that economic hardship and psychosocial factors (poor social support and experience of being belittled) seem to play a role in headache disorders. Of lifestyle factors, physical inactivity was strongly associated with headache disorders, while smoking to a lesser extent. Skipping breakfast, being overweight and underweight seemed to be connected to headaches.
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