The journal of headache and pain
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Recent studies suggested an important role for vascular factors in migraine etiopathogenesis. Notch4 belongs to a family of transmembrane receptors that play an important role in vascular development and maintenance. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that polymorphisms of the NOTCH4 gene would modify the occurrence and the clinical features of migraine. ⋯ Our study shows that genetic variations within the NOTCH4 gene significantly modify the clinical characteristics of migraine and may have a role in disease pathogenesis.
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The clinical profile of cluster headache in Chinese patients have not been fully studied. ⋯ Compared to Western patients, Chinese patients showed a relatively low prevalence of chronic cluster headaches, pain sites mainly focused on areas distributed by the first division of the trigeminal nerve, a low frequency of restlessness and absent aura. These clinical features may be more common in Eastern populations, including mainland Chinese, Japanese and Taiwanese patients, than in Western patients.
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Clinical Trial
Topiramate modulates habituation in migraine: evidences from nociceptive responses elicited by laser evoked potentials.
Lack of habituation during repetitive stimulation is the most consistent interictal abnormality of cortical information processing observed in migraine. Preventive migraine treatments might act by stabilizing cortical excitability level and thus the habituation to external stimuli. ⋯ Our results indicate a modulating action of topiramate on cortical processing of sensorial stimuli, mainly regarding the sensory-discriminative component of pain, elaborated by SII, without a significant effect on the affective dimension of pain, in which the ACC has an important role.
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A strong relationship between insomnia and painful disorders has been found, but it is still unclear whether chronic pain leads to insomnia. There is a need of large-scale prospective studies to evaluate if there is a causal relationship between painful disorders and insomnia. ⋯ In this prospective study headache and CMSCs were risk factors for insomnia 11 years later.
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Previous studies suggest that patients with Chronic Daily Headache (CDH) have higher levels of anxiety and depressive disorders than patients with episodic migraine or tension-type headache. However, no study has considered the presence of psychiatric comorbidity in the analysis of personality traits. The aim of this study is to investigate the prevalence of psychiatric comorbidity and specific personality traits in CDH patients, exploring if specific personality traits are associated to headache itself or to the psychiatric comorbidity associated with headache. ⋯ The so-called "Neurotic Profile" reached clinical level only in CDH patients with psychiatric comorbidity while a high concern about their general health status was a common feature in all CDH patients.