The diagnosis of migraine
headaches is based primarily on characteristics such
as its severity (moderate to severe), duration (4
to 72 hours), whether it is aggravated by normal physical
activity, and whether it is accompanied by other symptoms
such as nausea. There must not be any evidence of
organic disease.
Migraine Without Aura
(formerly known as "Common Migraine") and
Migraine With Aura (formerly known as "Classical
Migraine") are similar except for visual changes
such as the appearance of wavy lines in the eyes prior
to onset of headaches in people who experience "auras".
As you can see "migraine"
(as well as other headaches called “Tension-Type”,
“Cluster”, etc) is a category of headaches
which is principally based on words, not on blood
tests, x-rays, MRI's, CAT scans, or comparable tests.
They fall well within the range of conditions which
we treat.
In many cases, migraines
can be "triggered" by bright lights or foods
such as red wine, aged cheese, chocolate, etc. If
this is the case, avoidance of these triggers for
migraines and other headaches can be very helpful.
However, in many cases, the "trigger" is
an injured or otherwise dysfunctional muscle, tendon,
ligament, or joint. Our goal is to find and treat
these problem areas, thereby eliminating the pain,
regardless of how it’s categorized.
Following is a tiny
sample of the forms which our patients signed after
the completion of treatment. Each one was treated
in the manner outlined in the "" section of this website. As
you can see, all were relieved of their painful headaches.
To put it simply,
if there is no neurological condition such as a brain
tumor (which fortunately is only rarely the cause
of headaches), there is over a 90% probability that
we can resolve the painful problem.
As with all our patients,
our goal for those who suffer from migraines and other
headaches is to bring about healing to the maximum
extent possible rather than masking the cause with
drugs. In this way, we have been able to eliminate
the pain without side effects for well over 30 years.
“Cluster headaches affected my marriage, my children, my social life, and my work for 36 years. The pain was really the cause of my divorce. At first it felt like a knife was sticking in my eye four or five times a day but there were times that I was pain free. Eventually it attacked me every single day regardless of all the medications my eight neurologists had me take. I became very depressed and often thought of killing myself because of the pain. I was even hospitalized three times for a week at a time to take me off medications, but I never got any better.
You don’t know how happy you made me and my present wife by completely eliminating the pain! It’s miraculous. I can even sleep straight through the night for the first time in all these years. All the doctors and staff here are terrific. I never felt like a patient. I always felt like a friend.” - Marvel J.
“Starting 30 years ago I developed migraines and it felt like there was a dagger in my eye. I felt like I couldn’t make a rational decision and couldn’t get the words out that were in my head. Imitrex put me in zombie mode. Now that the pain is gone, I’m so much more aware. The people here treated me wonderfully .” - MaryAnne G.
“You can’t even describe how bad the migraine pain was for 35 years. The best I can say is that it’s like having a freight train in your head. Even my mother didn’t believe that the pain could be so excruciating and so often. I was afraid to go to sleep because the migraines woke me in the middle of the night. I’d put my head in hot water, in cold water, tie a belt around my head–anything to try to reduce the pain but nothing worked until I came to the Center for Headaches and Facial Pain. And now they’re gone.” - Deborah H.
