As heat waves sweep major parts of the Northwest and Central India leaving many heart-stricken, scientists have found a link between increased headaches and hot temperatures for individuals with migraine, saying that as mercury soars, so do chances for migraine attacks.
Changes in barometric pressure, extremely high temperatures and the threat of dehydration can increase the frequency of headaches, they said. The observation calls for health authorities to be on alert given that people with migraine face additional risks in the heat. Majority of Indian cities are already witnessing above 45 degree Celsius temperature owing to climate change.
“Weather change is one of the most common trigger factors for migraine”, said Vincent Martin, director of the Headache and Facial Pain Center at the US-based University of Cincinnati. The study looked at the use of Fremanezumab drug and whether it could prevent headaches caused by high temperatures.
Approved by the FDA, Fremanezumab is administered by injection under the skin and is part of a set of monoclonal antibodies that have hit the market in the past six years to treat migraine in patients.
Researchers cross-referenced 71,030 daily diary records of 660 migraine patients with regional weather data and found that for every temperature increase of 0.12 degrees Celsius, there was a 6 per cent increase in the occurrence of any headache.
However, during the periods of Fremanezumab treatment, the association completely disappeared. "This study is the first to suggest that migraine-specific therapies that block Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide (CGRP) may treat weather-associated headaches," said Fred Cohen, a study co-author and assistant professor of medicine at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York.
If the results are confirmed in future studies, the drug therapy has the potential to help many people with weather-triggered migraine , a condition that affects millions of people worldwide. The ability to mitigate the impact of high temperatures on headache frequency could greatly improve quality of life for many patients and reduce the overall burden on healthcare systems, especially during periods of extreme weather.
The human brain does best when outside temperatures are between 68 to 79 degrees Fahrenheit, said Sanjay Sisodiya, a neurologist at University College London and the lead author of another study published in The Lancet Neurology journal in May. It’s where “we feel thermally comfortable without having to do additional things.” But if the “temperature's taken out of that range,” he added, then the way the body’s components interact “can be disrupted.”
