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When You Should Worry About Migraine

Anyone who has experienced a very severe headache knows how disruptive and painful it can be. Migraine is a debilitating condition that can affect the overall quality of your life. When you experience recurring headaches, it affects the way you sleep, the way you work, and the way you conduct your everyday activities.

While some people choose to tough it out, it is better to seek medical attention for a thorough evaluation to rule out potentially serious problems, identify headache triggers, and provide treatment options.  A headache specialist can help migraine sufferers find pain relief and reduce emotional stress associated with tension type headaches.

When You Should Worry About Migraine

When to Seek Immediate Medical Attention

As previously mentioned, you should never ignore severe headaches. In some cases, a migraine is an indication of a serious underlying illness or problem. Here are some signs that your headache could be a medical emergency, and that you should call your doctor or visit the Emergency Room right away:

  • Explosive headache comes on suddenly
  • First severe headache of your life
  • It is the worst headache you have ever experienced
  • You had a head injury
  • You experience vision problems
  • You get a headache after intense physical activity
  • Changes in vision, such as blurred vision
  • Slurred speech
  • Confusion or memory problems
  • Difficulty moving your extremities (arms and legs)
  • Fever, vomiting, nausea, or stiff neck
  • Pain localized in one eye, with redness in that eye
  • History of cancer or compromised immunity
  • Worsening headache over 24 hours

 

Worrisome Headaches

Even if you do not need immediate emergency medical attention, you should make an appointment with your doctor if your headaches

  • Have no known cause
  • Last several days
  • Interfere with your sleep
  • Change in frequency, pattern, or intensity
  • Are more severe in the morning
When You Should Worry About Migraine

Types of Migraine

The first step to diagnosing migraines is determining the type of migraine you have. Unfortunately, there is no easy way to do this because migraines can vary in symptoms.

Here are the different types of migraine and their impacts on your body:

  • Migraine with Aura Symptoms. Before migraine attacks, you may experience sensory discomfort called aura. This causes being sensitive to light such as seeing blind spots, flashes of lights, or zigzag lines. The aura is also the reason for being highly sensitive to sounds and noises. After encountering the symptoms, this serves as a warning sign that you will experience a painful headache.
  • Migraine without Aura. This type of migraine does not have any aura-related symptoms. It gives you an immediately painful, throbbing headache on one side of your head. Other symptoms include vomiting and dizziness.
  • Hemiplegic Migraine. This type of migraine can be mistakenly identified as a stroke attack. It causes weakness to one side of the body. It also manifests symptoms of migraine with aura. Pulsating headache is less likely to be encountered for this type of migraine.
  • Acephalgic Migraine. It is also called “silent migraine” because it has all the symptoms of migraine with aura but there is no headache involved.
  • Retinal Migraine. This causes a temporary vision loss in one eye after a severe migraine headache. In some cases, an underlying condition may be the origin of the symptom.
  • Chronic Migraine. When you experience severe headaches every month for more than 15 days, you may be diagnosed with chronic migraine.
When You Should Worry About Migraine

Self Care for Migraine

Migraine sufferers learn to manage frequent headaches through self care. This refers to conscious acts one takes in order to promote physical, social, mental, spiritual, and emotional health. For instance, stress is a common trigger for migraine headaches or tension headaches. Lowering your stress can relieve your pain.  Practices such as meditation, recreation, getting enough sleep, and eating a healthy diet can have a significant impact for those who suffer from chronic headaches.

Self Care Check

  • Are you getting enough sleep?
  • Are you eating a healthy diet?
  • Are you exercising regularly?
  • Are you taking care of your mental health?
  • How are you recharging?
  • Are you spiritually and emotionally fulfilled?
  • Are you staying hydrated?

In addition to practicing good self-care, see your doctor for more options.

 

Ways Your Doctor Can Help

Even though there is no cure, there are many ways to treat headaches, including medicines to help deal with headache pain and to reduce the frequency of attacks. Recent advances in medicine mean a greater range of options to treat and prevent migraine symptoms.

In addition to treatments, your doctor may recommend migraine prevention steps. This may include making lifestyle changes, such as lowering your caffeine intake, avoiding certain foods, exercising regularly, eating healthy meals, weight loss, and generally leading a healthy lifestyle. It may also include changes to birth control and avoidance of certain triggers that provoke or worsen the intensity of your serious headaches.

Clinical trials also play a vital role in the continuous research of possible cures, new interventions, and medical approaches to aid in the efforts of battling migraine.

When You Should Worry About Migraine

Role of Clinical Trials in Migraine Treatment

If you have been suffering from migraine over the years, you may have exhausted many of the available treatment options, including pain medications, lifestyle changes, self-care, and other medical treatments.

Clinical trials for migraine seek to discover new treatments and find better solutions for every person affected by this neurological disease.  You can be a part of research efforts to help identify triggers and find effective treatments for people who suffer from headaches.

 

How to Enroll in Paid Clinical Trials for Migraine in Tampa

Santos Research Center in Tampa is open to participants for our ongoing research on new medical interventions to treat migraine. To schedule an appointment with us, call (813) 249-9100 or visit www.santosresearch.com.

Santos Research Center, Corp. is a research facility conducting paid clinical trials, in partnership with major pharmaceutical companies & CROs. We work with patients from across the Tampa Bay area.

Contact Details

5927 Webb Rd Tampa FL 33615
(813) 249-9100
(813) 249-9109
info@santosresearch.com
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