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Friday, 14 June 2013

Using Botox To Treat Migraines

By Cali Marinaw


In recent times, the uses for botulinum toxin treatments has increased significantly. Not only do clinics offer patients options to enhance their appearance using botox, there are other disorders that are treatable this way as well, including muscle spasticity. In the recent past, its use has now been extended to treating migraines.

Below, we will be going over how botox treatments have been used as of late to for this reason.

Background

Paralyzation occurs in the muscles due to botox injections, and because of this, the muscles stay in a relaxed position as they don't receive the nerve signals. It is produced by Clostridium botulinum, a bacterium. Its primary use is to relax the muscles around the eyes and other parts of the body, helping restore muscle tone and improving overall function.

Migraines and botox

The release of serotonin which is a neuro-chemical, is how migraines are mediated. Botox does not have any effect on this, but studies have shown that it can still help reduce pain in patients suffering from migraine.

This is still being researched and the reasons for the correlation are not clear at this time, but people are still pleased with the results they receive for their migraine issues. Botox has been suggested to be injected at 31 to 39 different points in the scalp. The most common theories that have been put forth:

The first thing is that nerve signal pain is stopped from being received.

Next, that it relaxes the scalp muscles and may help reduce blood pressure within the brain

Patients are reporting less headaches, and less severe when they occur, although the research to document this is still ongoing at this time.

Botox injections are recommended for chronic migraine sufferers who have had headaches for more than 15 days in a month and in those who have not responded to different drug treatments. Analgesic overuse headaches happen when a patient over5uses painkiller medications, so this must be examined for patients as well.

Treatments should be stopped if 2 cycles of botox injection treatments have failed, or the character of the migraine has changed and no longer meets the criteria of occurring on 15 days of a month.

What risks are there?

Botox injections into the scalp may cause neck pain and allergic reactions, but these are rare.

Conclusion

Migraines are now being treated by injections of botox, but it's still a new application for this condition. It's looking good for the future of botox for treating chronic migraine symptoms, but more studies need to be done to have more conclusive evidence.




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