If you suffer from migraines, there are various preventive treatments available to reduce both their frequency and severity. Prescribed by specialists, these drugs help minimize headaches in frequency and intensity – often multiple drugs will be combined together for maximum effectiveness.
Diaries can help you identify migraine triggers. Record when symptoms first started appearing, their duration, what helped or made things worse, as well as any changes that made things better or worsened them.
Avoiding triggers
Avoiding triggers is one way to effectively avoid migraine headaches, including foods, chemicals, and weather conditions. Stress may also be a trigger – although you cannot eliminate stress entirely through techniques like biofeedback and meditation these strategies will help manage emotional strain of daily living.
Foods that could induce migraines include aspartame, MSG, tyramine, monosodium glutamate (MSG), chocolate, caffeine, aged cheese or cured meats. Skipping meals may also trigger migraines; eating regularly is crucial. High humidity or hot temperatures can trigger them as well; staying hydrated with plenty of fluid intake will also help protect you against dehydration. Keeping a migraine diary may help identify personal triggers by recording the date, time and contributing factors for each migraine episode plus all relevant details regarding each episode including any outside influences that might contribute.
Taking preventive medications
Migraine prevention techniques incorporate lifestyle modifications and medications. Anti-CGRP agents are the most frequently prescribed anti-migraine agents; these work by blocking receptors and ligands of Calcitonin Gene-Related Protein (CGRP), which transmit pain signals. Other treatments often fail; when that is the case, headache specialists typically provide these prescriptions.
Other preventive treatments include acupuncture, melatonin and magnesium supplements. Green light therapy (using lamps that emit specific frequencies of light) has become popular as an inexpensive and easy method of relieving migraine symptoms at home. While more research must be conducted to verify its efficacy, green light therapy remains inexpensive and user friendly.
Biofeedback, which involves teaching yourself to intentionally control subconscious body functions while watching a monitor display physical responses, may be another option; however, most health insurers don’t cover this treatment option. Sometimes a single drug may need to be gradually increased until reaching its optimal dosage in order to prevent migraine attacks and minimize side effects; alternatively two or more drugs from different classes may be combined and administered in lesser than optimal doses for polytherapy – an approach often taken with two drugs at the same time or from different classes combined together – known as polytherapy.
Avoiding over-the-counter pain relievers
If you suffer from migraines, avoid over-the-counter pain relievers as overuse of them may lead to rebound headaches and dependency issues. Furthermore, certain ingredients of these medicines (like nitrates and monosodium glutamate) may trigger migraines themselves. Other options available to those dealing with migraines may include hot or cold therapy, massage and neuromodulation which can reduce pain by blocking nerve signals or releasing natural chemicals that relax tense muscles; always consult a physician first when making any preventive treatment decisions.
Migraine prevention techniques aim to decrease the frequency, severity and duration of migraine attacks while simultaneously decreasing acute medication needs. Such strategies include avoiding specific triggers like alcohol or caffeine consumption; altering sleep routines; staying well hydrated; managing stress effectively as a potential migraine trigger; as well as finding out which preventive medicines suit best; for instance beta blockers, antidepressants and seizure medications typically have long track records but may cause side effects in some people.
Keeping a migraine diary
Maintaining a migraine diary can help you to identify the triggers for your headaches and record their symptoms, which will enable your physician to assess severity and duration of an attack. Migraine diaries are especially useful if you’re just beginning preventive medications as it will allow you to monitor progress over time.
Migraine triggers can come in all forms: food, stress levels and weather changes can all play a part. Women using migraine diaries may even find that tracking their menstrual cycle plays a part in mitigating migraine attacks. Hormones have been shown to play an integral part in migraine occurrence.
A migraine diary can be kept using either a notebook, journal, app on your smartphone, or downloads. There are even free templates available for download that make this task simpler. Ensure you update it regularly at either a set time each day or minimum once each week.
