Over 29 million Americans suffer from migraines (migraineurs). The World Health Organization estimated that over one billion people in the world suffer from migraines. And these are just the people that have gotten a diagnosis. There may be a lot more people who dont realize that their headaches are really migraines. Because a migraine can cripple you with pain, there is a definite need for migraine headache medication. But a reliable migraine medication has so far eluded medical science.
Cause Still Unknown
Perhaps the main reason why there aren’t any reliable migraine medications good for the majority of migraineurs is because we do not know what the exact physical cause of migraines are. There are a lot of theories, but no one hard and fast cause. One of the longest held theories is that blood vessels in the brain dilate and constrict, causing a migraine. Some of today’s migraine medications and treatments still work using this theory.
This theory has been recently fallen out of favor with medical science and neurologists. The one in favor now is that migraines are caused by improper levels of the chemical serotonin (also thought to be the culprit for clinical depression). This might explain why the majority of migraineurs also have clinical depression or bipolar disorder.
Difficult To Diagnose
Another reason that many migraineurs still suffer is because they dont realize that their pain is due to migraines. And you cant get any kind of migraine medication if you are being treated for something else. Ideally, you need to have had years of experience of suffering through migraines in order to get a quick diagnosis. But migraines can come on very suddenly at any age. If a person suddenly gets a migraine, it is very similar to a stroke and (just to be on the safe side) the person is treated for a stroke.
Migraines can also be a symptom as well as a disease in their own right. People with epilepsy, with certain kinds of cancers and those having a very bad reaction to a new drug will also get migraines. Also, people can get their own kind of migraines that do not always act the same each time. It can very difficult getting the proper migraine medication under all of these circumstances.
Cost
Although some migraineurs have successfully used over the counter NSAIDs as migraine medication, many have to take prescription preventatives (or abortives). There are migraine medications to be taken at the moment you realize you are having an attack. All of these are incredibly expensive. This often forces people to choose between getting migraine medication and paying their rent.
