Weather may be a headache for migraine sufferers Thurs., July 11, 2001 9:00 a.m. ET

Lucas J. Mire, weather.com (health) Fair Use More than 50 percent of migraine sufferers say their headaches have a weather 'trigger,' according to new research. "I can always tell when a storm's coming and the pressure changes. It's a definite influence on my headaches," Cheryl Harrington explained.

Harrington isn't alone according to physicians who specialize in the treatment of migraine headaches. Though a scientific relationship between weather conditions and the onset of headaches is a bit fuzzy, most physicians acknowledge a connection.

"My staff bought me a barometer, so we could watch for changes," said Dr.Charles Matthews, director of the North Carolina comprehensive headache clinic in Raleigh. "It would kind of tell us what our day was going to be like."

Migraine sufferers as forecasters

Matthews also reported that his patients could tell, based on the onset of their headaches, that there was a weather change coming the next day.

Dr. Alan Rapoport, a doctor with the New England Center for Headaches in Stanford, Conn., concurs with Matthews' claim.

"For people that had the [migraine] trigger factor of changing weather patterns, many of them could probably predict what the weather was going to be," said Rapoport. "They could tell you what kind of weather was going to come within 24 hours."

Rapoport was so intrigued by this unproven connection that he and his colleague, Dr. Patricia Birgeneau Prince, decided to investigate the phenomenon by tracking their patients' headaches and the concurrent weather conditions.

The pair presented the results of their study at the recent 10th annual International Headache Congress. Some of their findings contradicted their expectations.

"People often implicate high temperature and humidity as the most common contributing factors," Birgeneau Prince said in a statement. "But our study suggests a combination of low humidity and cold weather is even more common than the opposite in triggering migraines."

The duo studied 77 patients over a two-year-period and found that more than half of the participants in the study had a weather trigger that preceded the onset of a migraine. The low humidity and cold combination affected 22 percent of the participants, while heat and high humidity triggered 12 percent. Some participants had more than one weather trigger.

"The next couple of patients were affected by changing weather patterns," explained Rapoport. "Going from cool and dry to hot and humid, or the barometer going up and down, also proved to be a trigger."

More answers, more questions

Though the results of their research are a promising step to firmly establishing the link between weather and headaches, doctors still are unclear as to why changes in the weather affects people so strongly.

"There's definitely a very interesting relationship between weather and migraines," said Dr. Matthews, who believes a dense bundle of veins at the back of the nose holds the key. The veins internally regulate the humidity of inhaled air so that it doesn't damage the lungs, according to Matthews.

"These veins have to adjust to a certain pressure, be aware of the air pressure, to figure out how much they have to dilate or contract," he explained. "If there's a sudden change, they have to adapt to keep the air at the right humidity. In migraine sufferers, this vascular system adapts too quickly. Basically, people with migraines and weather triggers have trouble adapting their vascular system to changes in the weather."

Migraines can also be brought on by certain foods, or even emotions, Matthews said, but weather may be the strongest trigger. While others may debunk such a relationship, Matthews says the numbers tell the story.

"We probably get a third more patients in here on a pressure-change day."

Rapoport says his study is the first step in helping migraine sufferers with an identifiable weather trigger reduce their headaches.

"If we knew what patients had which weather trigger, we could look ahead to the forecast and they could know to get their acute headache [medication] ready."

What can you do?

If changes in barometric pressure seem to be a link between weather and migraines, could sufferers theoretically avoid headaches by relocating to a place that doesn't undergo drastic weather changes?

"Although there's no place on earth where the barometric pressure remains constant, there are areas that see more of a variation and areas that see less of a variation," said Colin Marquis, a senior meteorologist at The Weather Channel.

"Tropical locations, that is locations closer to the equator, would tend to see less variation. Weather in the middle latitudes - -not the tropics, not the poles - - those are the areas that tend to see the most change in barometric pressure. Of, this includes the United States and the world's most populated areas."

Rapoport concedes that if there is a connection between barometer changes and the weather, living in the right place might help certain help manage headaches.

"There's not a place for every patient, but if a falling barometer triggers your migraines, you might feel better in a place like Arizona, where it's hot and humid."

-- Anonymous, August 22, 2001