So Much More Than a Headache PDF Download

Author: Kathleen O'Shea
Publisher: Kent State University
ISBN: 9781606354032
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
"English," wrote Virginia Woolf, "which can express the thoughts of Hamlet and the tragedy of Lear, has no words for the shiver and the headache. . . . let a sufferer try to describe a pain in his head to a doctor and language at once runs dry." Despite Woolf's astute observation and the apparent dearth of writings on such subjects, editor Kathleen O'Shea has managed to gather a wide selection of helpful excerpts, chapters, poetry, and even a short play in this anthology--all with a view toward increasing our understanding and ending the stigma attached to migraines and migraine sufferers. Unlike clinical materials, this anthology addresses the feelings and symptoms that the writers have experienced, sometimes daily. These pieces speak freely about the loneliness and helplessness one feels when a migraine comes on. The sufferer faces nausea, pain, sensitivity to light, and having the veracity of all these symptoms doubted by others. O'Shea, a professor of literature and a migraine sufferer herself, also includes an original essay of her own reflections. Offered as an alternative not only to medical writing but also to self-help books and internet blogs, So Much More Than a Headache addresses a real omission in the available works on migraine, provides a resource for those who may have underestimated the depth and range of writing on this subject, and challenges the cultural bias that dismisses migraine as "just a headache."

Author: Dr. Elizabeth Leroux
Publisher: Dundurn
ISBN: 145973291X
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 176

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Book Description
A complete guide on how to treat and prevent migraines. Though often viewed as a “women’s ailment,” migraines affect nearly 15 percent of the world’s population. In addition to the effect migraines have on the sufferers’ quality of life, they also carry an economic cost, felt especially in the form of lost work time. But by recognizing the problem and taking necessary action, migraine sufferers today can take back control of their lives. This comprehensive, easy-to-read guide to migraine management answers all the most pressing questions of sufferers and those concerned for their health. Clinical neurologist Dr. Elizabeth Leroux explains what can predispose a person to experiencing migraines, what can trigger them, their phases, and the three recommended lines of treatment: lifestyle changes, crisis management, and preventative therapy. Emphasizing the need for good doctor-patient communication in a field where misunderstanding and frustration is too-often the norm, this book is as much a tool for health care professionals as it is for migraine sufferers and their families.

Author: Oliver Sacks
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307834107
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 462

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Book Description
From the renowned neurologist and bestselling author of Awakenings and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat comes a fascinating investigation of the many manifestations of migraine, including the visual hallucinations and distortions of space, time, and body image which migraineurs can experience. “So erudite, so gracefully written, that even those people fortunate enough never to have had a migraine in their lives should find it equally compelling.” —The New York Times The many manifestations of migraine can vary dramatically from one patient to another, even within the same patient at different times. Among the most compelling and perplexing of these symptoms are the strange visual hallucinations and distortions of space, time, and body image which migraineurs sometimes experience. Portrayals of these uncanny states have found their way into many works of art, from the heavenly visions of Hildegard von Bingen to Alice in Wonderland. Dr. Oliver Sacks argues that migraine cannot be understood simply as an illness, but must be viewed as a complex condition with a unique role to play in each individual's life.

Author: Lawrence D. Robbins
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN: 9780618044368
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description
Arguing that an appropriate medication has the best potential for relieving a headache, a guide to headache treatment discusses different types of pain, and conventional and alternative options for prevention or treatment.

Author: David Buchholz
Publisher: Workman Publishing
ISBN: 0761125663
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Based on the breakthrough understanding that virtually all headaches are forms of migraine--because migraine is not a specific type of headache, but the built-in mechanism that causes headaches of all kinds, along with neck stiffness, sinus congestion, dizziness, and other problems--Dr. Buchholz's Heal Your Headache puts headache sufferers back in control of their lives with a simple, transforming program: Step 1: Avoid the "Quick Fix." Too often painkillers only make matters worse because of the crippling complication known as rebound. Step 2: Reduce Your Triggers. The crux of the program: a migraine diet that eliminates the foods that push headache sufferers over the top. Step 3: Raise Your Threshold. When diet and other lifestyle changes aren't enough, preventive medication can help stay the course. That's it: in three steps turn your headache problems around.

Author: Katherine Foxhall
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
ISBN: 1421429489
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 293

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Book Description
Deeply researched and beautifully written, this fascinating and accessible study of one of our most common, disabling—and yet often dismissed—disorders will appeal to physicians, historians, scholars in medical humanities, and people living with migraine alike.

Author: Hans-Christoph Diener
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 3642733271
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 174

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Book Description
M. WILKINSON Patients with frequent or daily headaches pose a very difficult problem for the physician who has to treat them, particularly as many patients think that there should be a medicine or medicines which give them instant relief. In the search for the compound which would meet this very natural desire, many drugs have been manufactured and the temptation for the physician is either to increase the dose of a drug which seems to be, at any rate, partially effective, or to add one or more drugs to those which the patient is already taking. Although there have been some references to the dangers of overdosage of drugs for migraine in the past, it was not until relatively recently that it was recognized that drugs given for the relief of headache, if taken injudiciously, may themselves cause headache. The first drugs to be implicated in this way were ergotamine and phenazone. In the case of ergotamine tartrate, the dangers of ergotism were well known as this was a disorder which had been known and written about for many years. In the treatment of headache, fully blown ergotism is rare and in recent years has usually been due to self-medication in doses much greater than those prescribed although there are a few recorded cases where toxic amounts have been given.

Author: Seymour Diamond
Publisher: Academic Press
ISBN: 0128011629
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 334

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Book Description
There are two crucial issues in the treatment and management of headache patients: More than 50% of individuals experiencing headache have only been treated symptomatically, with no appropriate diagnosis established; and history and neurologic examination are essential to establishing a diagnosis, and thus selecting appropriate therapy. Headache and Migraine Biology and Management is a practical text that addresses these issues, featuring contributions from expert clinical authors. The book covers in detail topics including chronic and episodic migraine, post-traumatic headache, sinus headache, cluster headache, tension headache, and others. Chapters are also dedicated to treatment subjects, including psychiatric and psychological approaches, medication overuse, inpatient treatment, and pediatric issues. This book is an ideal resource for researchers and clinicians, uniting practical discussion of headache biology, current ideas on etiology, future research, and genetic significance and breakthroughs. This resource is useful to those who want to understand headache biology, treat and manage symptoms, and for those performing research in the headache field. - A practical discussion of headache biology, current ideas on etiology, future research, and genetic significance and breakthroughs - Features chapters from leading physicians and researchers in headache medicine - Full-color text that includes both an overview of multiple disciplines and discusses the measures that can be used to treat headaches

Author: Joanna Kempner
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022617915X
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
Migraine is an extraordinarily common, disabling, and painful disorder that affects over 36 million Americans and costs the US economy at least $32 billion per year. Nevertheless, it is frequently dismissed, ignored, and delegitimised. In this book, Joanna Kempner argues that this general dismissal of migraine can be traced back to the gendered social values embedded in the way we talk about, understand, and make policies for people in pain.

Author: Robert Vink
Publisher: University of Adelaide Press
ISBN: 0987073052
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 354

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Book Description
The brain is the most complex organ in our body. Indeed, it is perhaps the most complex structure we have ever encountered in nature. Both structurally and functionally, there are many peculiarities that differentiate the brain from all other organs. The brain is our connection to the world around us and by governing nervous system and higher function, any disturbance induces severe neurological and psychiatric disorders that can have a devastating effect on quality of life. Our understanding of the physiology and biochemistry of the brain has improved dramatically in the last two decades. In particular, the critical role of cations, including magnesium, has become evident, even if incompletely understood at a mechanistic level. The exact role and regulation of magnesium, in particular, remains elusive, largely because intracellular levels are so difficult to routinely quantify. Nonetheless, the importance of magnesium to normal central nervous system activity is self-evident given the complicated homeostatic mechanisms that maintain the concentration of this cation within strict limits essential for normal physiology and metabolism. There is also considerable accumulating evidence to suggest alterations to some brain functions in both normal and pathological conditions may be linked to alterations in local magnesium concentration. This book, containing chapters written by some of the foremost experts in the field of magnesium research, brings together the latest in experimental and clinical magnesium research as it relates to the central nervous system. It offers a complete and updated view of magnesiums involvement in central nervous system function and in so doing, brings together two main pillars of contemporary neuroscience research, namely providing an explanation for the molecular mechanisms involved in brain function, and emphasizing the connections between the molecular changes and behavior. It is the untiring efforts of those magnesium researchers who have dedicated their lives to unraveling the mysteries of magnesiums role in biological systems that has inspired the collation of this volume of work.