Finally: Scientists say the headache is overdue

An estimated 730 million people -around 10% of the world population suffer migraine: the most common type of headache characterized by intense and disabling attacks. Some people have sporadic attacks, lasting 4 to 72 hours, but some chronic patients (around 8% of those suffering from the disease) have fifteen or more attacks per month, making them people with disabilities for life.
But, despite being a disease known since millennia -the first reference to it is in Babylonian documents over 5,000 years ago - so far the only drugs that patients may have served to mitigate the pain after the attack. There is no cure or preventive measures.
If approved, it would be the first treatment that manages to avoid the headaches, a sort of vaccine against migraine appear
That is good news as the announcement of a group of US neurologists, who claims to have identified the hypersensitive nervous system responsible for the attacks and have a drug able to disable it and therefore inhibit the emergence of headaches. From marketing approvals something which scientists say could happen next year-it would be the first drug specifically designed to prevent headaches, a sort of vaccine migraine appear.carnival 2016

The result of a work that lasts for decades

As David Noonan explained in Scientific American, Professor Peter Goadsby, director of the Headache Center at the University of California at San Francisco, is one of the heads of which may be the biggest breakthrough to combat headaches. Since the 80s, the scientist focused its research on studying the trigeminal nerve, known to be the main route of pain in the brain and where, as he managed to check, migraines originate.

Peter Goadsby.

Thanks to various studies in animals, Goadsby and colleagues found that in some people the -situated nerve in the back of the brain and connected to various parts of the face and head, is usually benign sensitive to stimuli such as light, sound or odors, and releases neurotransmiroses that send pain signals to the brain, causing migraine. This pathological sensitivity of nerve cells seems to also be due to genetic causes: 80% of patients have a history of the disease in their family history.
Since Goadsby published the first article on the subject in 1988, several groups of scientists have tried to somehow inhibit the action of nerve. His goal was to find a way to block pain signals.
One of the chemical compounds found in high levels in people with migraine is the calcitonin gene-related peptide (CGRP known as by its acronym), responsible for pain transmission between neurons substance. Scientists have worked decades to try to inhibit the action of CGRP in migraine patients, but it was extremely complex because as often happens with all such substances, it is very difficult silence without losing the rest of its functions without influence the correct functioning of the surrounding compounds.
New drugs are as precision-guided missiles. They go directly to your target
New drugs are actually design proteins which bind to CGRP molecules or their receptors in nerve neurons trigénimo to prevent its response to be triggered to benign stimuli. These are drugs that, as explained in 'Scientific American' another of the researchers involved in the discovery, Dr. Mayo Clinic David Dodick, work   "As precision-guided missiles. They go directly to your goal. "

There are people who suffer migraines daily. (Corbis)

Promising clinical trials

The two trials with control groups conducted to date have researchers clapping. In total 380 patients suffering more than 14 migraines per month received a single injection attacks reduced by more than 60%. In the first study, in addition, 16% of patients remained completely free from headaches for 12 weeks.
According to Dodlick, this drug "completely changes the paradigm on how to treat migraine." Although clinical trials are larger to continue testing the drug's effectiveness, the research is clear that the new invention works better than any of the existing drugs to date, such as triptans, which are so far the most used-, and produces far fewer side effects. In addition, they are more comfortable: enough that patients receive only a weekly injection.
The view is that the trigénimo nerve malfunction of CGRP are responsible for migraines, but what remains a mystery is why they appear. "What is the nature of what you inherit when you inherit migraines?" Asks Goadsby. "Why you and not me?". It's a question that we still have no answer, but more importantly, it is end the pain suffered by millions of people, it could be achieved in a matter of years.