With A Cluster Headache You Will Experience True Pain

Cluster headaches are one of the most painful conditions known to man and their one and only saving grace is that they are fortunately quite rare. For instance, though roughly one person in ten of the population suffers from migraine, only about one person out of three hundred will experience a cluster headache.

A cluster headache normally appears as what a lot of sufferers describe as a hot and stabbing pain behind just one eye or in the area of the temple. Their chief characteristic however is that they follow a timetable and will appear at roughly the same time each day often for several days, or even weeks or months at a time. They also tend to strike without any warning, unlike migraines which are often preceded by a number of warning signs.

Nobody is quite sure what causes these particularly painful headaches although research favors the theory that they are the result of abnormalities in the hypothalamus. The hypothalamus is a small gland which plays an important role in regulating your body's internal clock and this could explain why headaches appear at the same time each day.

Another feature of cluster headaches that distinguishes them from migraines is that are much more common in men than in women. In the case of migraines some three times as many women as men are sufferers however, in the case of cluster headaches, studies show that they are seen up to eight times more often in men.

Traditional treatments for normal headaches are virtually always ineffective for cluster headaches and this is one class of headache for which you have to seek advice from your physician.

One frequently used treatment is that of inhaling pure oxygen for a few minutes once the headache begins. This particular form of treatment will not work for everybody but usually works very well for those who do find it is helpful. It will not however prevent a cluster headache and only works in treating a headache once it has started.

Yet another very effective treatment is that of using a new type of drugs called triptans which are currently being used for the treatment of migraine headaches. These drugs must however be taken in a very fast acting form if they are to be effective and this usually means using them as a nasal spray. However, in many cases cluster headaches can also cause inflammation of the nasal passages making this form of treatment difficult. Here, triptans can sometimes be given by injection.

At this time there are no good preventative treatments available for cluster headaches although some sufferers find that calcium channel blockers work fairly well. In addition, in very severe cases surgery may be considered as a treatment of last resort and several neurological procedures are available including procedures to block certain nerves and which remove part of the brain.