Migraine is a draining
condition for its sufferers. It’s costly in terms of
pain, money, and pharmacological use necessity. Drugs remain
the “gold standard” of care. Patients often request choices from their
migraine healthcare providers for non-pharamacological alternatives.
Malverne migraine sufferers want choices!
Malverne Health & Wellness proposes that exercise may be one
such useful choice.
EXERCISE FOR CHRONIC PAIN
Migraine is, for most Malverne migraine sufferers,
a chronic pain condition. It’s not usually a one and done situation. Chronic pain disturbs
the nervous system as well as the specific pain-generating
issue. Researchers described evidence that exercise helps a
variety of chronic pain conditions including migraine directly and indirectly
with an aim to change the cycle of pain,
sedentariness, and declining disability. These
changes don’t come overnight. They come with
long-term, regular, individualized exercise resulting
in improvement in pain and function. (1) Malverne Health & Wellness reminds
our Malverne chiropractic patients with all types of
conditions that it’s slow and steady commitment that results in desired
outcomes.
EXERCISE FOR MIGRAINE BEING STUDIED
Researchers and migraine sufferers alike hold out hope for a
simple, low-cost approach to migraine care. Case in point, a new comparison study of
neck-specific exercise set against sham ultrasound to decrease
the frequency and intensity of migraine attacks. (2) A new meta-analysis
in Headache stated that aerobic exercise for migraine patients
decreased the number of migraine days. (3) These are valuable
outcomes for Malverne migraine treatment.
EXERCISE BENEFITS: Overall and Migraine Specific
Malverne chiropractic patients are manytimes
urged to exercise. Exercise appears to be a recommended
panacea for everything from back pain to migraine to depression to neck pain
and so much more. Why? It works. Exercise stifles inflammation
via reduction of inflammatory modulators (many cytokines) and stress hormones
(growth hormone and cortisol). Exercise positively influences
the microvascular system that certainly influences
a certain type of cortical spreading depression. Specific
to migraine, exercise helped migraine self-efficacy by allowing
the migraine sufferer to have a sense of control which reduced
migraine burden. How much exercise does this?
“Sufficiently rigorous aerobic exercise” resulted in statistically
significant reduction in migraine frequency, intensity and
duration. That is welcomed by Malverne
migraine sufferers! Naturally, higher intensity exercise appears
to bring about more benefit. Pharmacological drugs like topiramate were
reported to be superior to exercise, but including
exercise into its use was suggested to provide
benefit. Migraine sufferers
who also experience neck pain or tension headache are reported to benefit from exercise. Low impact is worthwhile
if high impact exercise is not possible. (4) Malverne Health & Wellness agrees
with the researchers’ outcome: exercise is a reasonable
evidence-based recommendation for migraine prevention.
CONTACT Malverne Health & Wellness
Listen to this PODCAST
with Dr. David Kulla on The
Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he shares
how he followed The
Cox®
Technic System of Spinal Pain Management for his patient with
migraine which incorporated Cox® Technic spinal manipulation
as well as exercise for welcomed relief by his patient.