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| |  12th Migraine Trust-DG Dispatch: Maxalt Shown Effective For Migraine LONDON, ENGLAND -- Sept. 8, 1998 -- A new drug available in the United States and Britain that is administered as a quick-dissolving oral wafer was said to offer one of the fastest response rates available for migraine sufferers. The statement was made at an international conference on migraine headaches held in London, England last week. The peppermint-flavoured wafer, Merck & Co.’s Maxalt RPD (rizatriptan) is slightly larger than an ordinary ASA tablet and dissolves completely within 10 seconds of being placed on the tongue. It is said to deliver relief from migraine pain in as little as one-half hour, but perhaps more important, spares migraine sufferers the need to take an oral pill with a glass of water which often precipitates nausea and vomiting. Among patients taking the wafer, 22 per cent were said to be pain-free in as little as a half hour as compared with just 11 per cent of those who took a placebo. By the two-hour mark, three quarters of those taking the wafer were pain-free as compared with just 28 per cent in the placebo group. Nausea, photophobia and phonophobia were all reduced by twice as much among those who took the 10 mg wafer as compared with those who took a placebo. The wafer formulation is expected to be available commercially in Canada in early 1999. XXXXXXXXXX Lying down provides no relief for migraine pain, study shows Lying down rarely offers any relief from the pain of a migraine headache, European doctors report. Lying down rarely improves or alleviates migraine pain and, in fact, will aggravate the pain in many cases. However, lying down often presents a convenient means of getting away form the sound and light that aggravate migraine misery. Eighty-nine per cent of migraine patients reported that they typically lie down during the migraine attack but they are not able to lie flat and instead prop themselves up with extra pillows. They report the pressure from the pillow offers some relief, but not much for the migraine pain. They did report some benefit if they were able to sleep though the headache though. Migraine sufferers also report aggravation of the symptoms when they bend forward, or perform even moderately strenuous activities. By contrast people with tension type headaches were less than half as likely to report aggravation of the symptoms by bending forward or performing any physical activity, but nor were they likely to report any therapeutic benefit from lying down either. Approximately five per cent of the adult population suffer from migraine headaches. Headaches not caused by refractive errors, doctors say. Headaches and problems with eye-glasses might seem to go hand-in-hand and people wearing eye-glasses often blame their headache on a bad prescription for their glasses. However, doctors in Europe claim there is little connection between the two. In fact, people who need eye-glasses, or who have incorrect prescriptions are no more likely to suffer from frequent headaches than those who wear the correct prescription eye-glasses, or who do not have visual problems at all. If refractive errors do cause headaches at all, their importance is wildly over-estimated, the doctors report. People without headaches, whether they wore glasses or not, spent more time each day on eye-straining activities such as working on a computer, reading and performing fine visual tasks than those who had headaches, the doctors report. Furthermore, neither the severity of the refractive error, nor the type of refractive error - myopia, presbyopia or astigmatism, had any bearing on the severity of the headaches that subjects experienced. Headaches caused by refractive errors are fairly rare and are believed to occur in just six to seven per cent of the population. Tension headaches, on the other hand, occur in almost one-third of the population, while migraines occur in five per cent of the population. XXXXXXXXXX Not this weekend dear, I’ve got a headache People who suffer from weekend headaches are more likely to describe their jobs as unrewarding than those who do not suffer from weekend headaches, they are less likely to be involved with hobbies or outside interests and they are more likely to have work waiting for them when they arrive home, either in the form of housework, or with work from the office to do than people who do not suffer from weekend headaches, doctors in Italy report. Interestingly, men are far more likely to suffer from weekend headaches than women. There is a barely perceptible peak in the number of women who report weekend headaches whereas there was a striking increase in the number of men who reported headaches throughout the weekend, tapering off by Tuesday.
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