Migraine is a debilitating
condition for its sufferers. It’s expensive in terms of
pain, money, and pharmacological use need. Drugs are still
the “gold standard” of care. Patients often ask their
migraine healthcare providers for non-pharamacological options.
McHenry migraine sufferers want options!
OrthoIllinois Chiropractic proposes that exercise may be one
such beneficial choice.
EXERCISE FOR CHRONIC PAIN
Migraine is, for most McHenry migraine sufferers,
a chronic pain condition. It is not usually a one and done condition. Chronic pain disrupts
the nervous system and 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 emerge overnight. They come with
long-term, consistent, individualized exercise bringing about improvement in pain and function. (1) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic tells
our McHenry chiropractic patients with all types of
conditions that it is slow and steady commitment that results in desired
outcomes.
EXERCISE FOR MIGRAINE BEING STUDIED
Researchers and migraine sufferers alike hold out hope for an easy, inexpensive approach to migraine care. For
example, a recent comparison project of
neck-specific exercise set against sham ultrasound to reduce
the frequency and intensity of migraine attacks. (2) A recent meta-analysis
in Headache stated that aerobic exercise for migraine patients
dropped the number of migraine days. (3) These are valuable
outcomes for McHenry migraine treatment.
EXERCISE BENEFITS: Overall and Migraine Specific
McHenry chiropractic patients are often
urged to exercise. Exercise appears to be a endorsed
panacea for everything from back pain to migraine to depression to neck pain
and so much more. Why? It works. Exercise suppresses inflammation
via reduction of inflammatory modulators (many cytokines) and stress hormones
(growth hormone and cortisol). Exercise constructively impacts
the microvascular system that certainly influences
a certain type of cortical spreading depression. Specific
to migraine, exercise benefited migraine self-efficacy by allowing
the migraine sufferer to have a sense of control which lessened
migraine burden. How much exercise produces this type of effect?
“Sufficiently rigorous aerobic exercise” resulted in statistically
significant drop in migraine frequency, intensity and
duration. That’s appreciated by McHenry
migraine sufferers! Of course, higher intensity exercise appears
to bring about more benefit. Pharmacological drugs like topiramate were
noted to be better than exercise, but adding exercise to its use was suggested to provide
benefit. Migraine sufferers
who also experience neck pain or tension headache are reported as
benefiting from exercise. Low impact is valuable
if high impact exercise is not doable. (4) OrthoIllinois Chiropractic concurs
with the researchers’ bottom-line: exercise is a practical
evidence-based recommendation for migraine prevention.
CONTACT OrthoIllinois Chiropractic
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 included Cox® Technic spinal manipulation
as well as exercise for appreciated relief by his patient.