Migraine is a frustrating
condition for its sufferers. It’s costly 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-drug options.
Vancouver migraine sufferers want alternative ideas!
Vancouver Spine Care Centre puts forward that exercise may be one
such beneficial choice.
EXERCISE FOR CHRONIC PAIN
Migraine is, for most Vancouver migraine sufferers,
a chronic pain condition. It’s not usually a one
time situation. Chronic pain affects
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 worsening disability. These
changes do not come overnight. They come with
long-term, consistent, individualized exercise giving rise to improvement in pain and function. (1) Vancouver Spine Care Centre reminds
our Vancouver chiropractic patients with all sorts 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 an easy, 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 recent meta-analysis
in Headache stated that aerobic exercise for migraine patients
dropped the number of migraine days. (3) These are valuable
outcomes for Vancouver migraine treatment.
EXERCISE BENEFITS: Overall and Migraine Specific
Vancouver chiropractic patients are manytimes
urged to exercise. Exercise seems like 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 positively influences
the microvascular system that possibly influences
a certain type of cortical spreading depression. Migraine specifically, exercise helped migraine self-efficacy by allowing
the migraine sufferer to have a sense of control which lessened
migraine burden. How much exercise does this?
“Sufficiently rigorous aerobic exercise” brought about statistically
significant drop in migraine frequency, intensity and
duration. That’s welcomed by Vancouver
migraine sufferers! Naturally, higher intensity exercise seems
to allow more benefit. Pharmacological drugs like topiramate were
reported to be better than exercise, but including
exercise into its use was suggested to be beneficial. 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) Vancouver Spine Care Centre concurs
with the researchers’ outcome: exercise is a reasonable
evidence-based recommendation for migraine prevention.
CONTACT Vancouver Spine Care Centre
Listen to this PODCAST
with Dr. David Kulla on The
Back Doctors Podcast with Dr. Michael Johnson as he presents
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 welcomed relief by his patient.