What to Do When Nothing Seems to Alleviate Your Chronic Migraines

One of the painfully unique characteristics of migraines can be their persistence. Often, you can try a series of varied treatments, with none providing sufficient relief. It can be disheartening to feel as though nothing works and you’re out of options. 

It’s a common situation when migraine patients arrive at Farhad Elyaderani, MD for treatment. Defining chronic migraine patients as those suffering from 15 or more headache days every month, Dr. Farhad Elyaderani often finds that a migraine diagnosis is incomplete or that the use of medications might be poorly communicated. Sometimes, the presentation is atypical migraine and is already missed or not recognized. 

What to do when nothing seems to alleviate your chronic migraines

Finding migraine relief at this stage may mean stepping back and breaking through the assumptions you’ve had about your condition and retracing through the process. It’s a common pattern for any chronic pain management situation when results are hard to come by. Migraines add their own unique challenges to the mix. 

Reasons why migraine treatments can fail

Migraines don’t come in a single type, and a misdiagnosis or, more commonly, an incomplete diagnosis can lead to ineffective treatments. Working with a neurologist who specializes in headaches and migraines, like Dr. Elyaderani, provides the new perspective so often necessary to navigate through treatment of migraines that seem to resist treatment. 

Beyond missed or incomplete diagnosis, there are several other common tripping points where previous treatments fail. 

Is it a migraine?

The headache pain that you’ve been calling a migraine may in fact, be another type of headache, or you may have an underlying health condition that must be treated first before you can expect to see progress against your headaches. 

Expectations for treatment

When you take a medication, and it doesn’t seem to make any difference, there are reasons why a drug or other therapy seems to fail. These include: 

• Not every medication takes effect in the same time frame, so you may see no results in a week as a failure when you don’t know that the drug typically takes longer (up to two months, for example) to show results
• The medical definition for success of a migraine treatment may not match your expectations
• Nausea and vomiting from migraine pain may interfere with absorption of medications through your digestive system

Unidentified migraine triggers

Certain conditions and substances can bring on migraine episodes, and these triggers can be unique for every patient. You may have overlooked some triggers or made incorrect assessments of others. Talk to Dr. Elyaderani about potentially unidentified triggers, and keep a journal of the conditions leading up to and through your migraine episodes. 

Incomplete medical history

Seemingly unconnected conditions and habits could be counteracting or limiting your migraine treatment plans. An undiagnosed secondary disorder could affect the best approach to migraines. Conditions like anxiety, depression, or sleep disorders could change the treatment approach for your migraines, so it’s important to fully communicate aspects of your health to assure Dr. Elyaderani has a complete picture of your health. 

Contact us at Farhad Elyaderani MD in New Rochelle, New York, to find effective relief for your migraine condition. Call or click to schedule your consultation today.