Hello all, This is my first post as I recently discovered this website! I'm about a 2 year veteran of CHs and have not tried any treatments besides water  :-/ I am not too excited by the prospect of being on consistent preventative medication and was wondering if anyone had positive experiences with melatonin, capsaicin (cayenne), or kudzu? I'd appreciate to know as many details as possible! Thank you for your time!

can you tell us more about yourself and your diagnosis? Yes people have had some success with kudzu. yes some people have had some success with melatonin for sleep. capsaicin is snake oil!
give it a snort and see what you think. stick around and read what help is available but it is tough to say much without knowing more about you. best wishes...

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Are you episodic or chronic? I'd look into O2 actually. Blessings. lance

Welcome to the board Bean, what they said! ;)

Clusterbusters.com

This is our sister site which goes into great depth on numerous alternative treatments.

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Read this link on oxygen. Whe it comes to abortives that are fats, effective, cheap and lacking in any side effects, it's hard to beat.

Are you working with an experienced headache specialist neurologist? Our experience has been that most GP's and garden variety neuros just don't have the experience or knowledge base to effectively treat CH. Glad you found us, keep reading, knowledge is your best ally.

Joe

You will receive a range of yes/no responses about alternative treatments but what is lacking in this area are the controlled trials which give some hard data about outcomes/side effects, etc.

Personally, I don't object to alternative approaches but would start with the standardized treatments because the data offer better outcome guidance.

Listen to Bob.....Listen to Bob.
02,02,02 why use grenades when you might get by with just a hammer. You have to start with the least invasive treaments and then move on to the tougher stuff.....study up on your condition. 8-)
all the best
the bb
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I switched to Kudzu several years ago when the side effects from Verap and Lithium became to much.  Actually did better with it and without side effects.  YMMV. 

START PRINTPAGEMultimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or END PRINTPAGE would be my first option if it was possible for me.

Jerry

Thank you all! I really enjoyed the plainboard article as well as the journal article on O2 from cluster busters. I am episodic, with very few recognizable triggers.

I was reading an abstract from a journal article that mentioned episodic patients' testosterone levels were extremely low during attacks, and was somehow correlated to poor REM cycles. My neuro from the Mayo suggested I may be getting poor REM sleep, but I have not noticed this in my own routine. Any experiences with hormone level testing and a correlation with low testosterone?

There is a whole thread on testosterone. (there are others also, use the search tool) I'm having my testo checked, will have results in 2-3 weeks.
In that 2-3 year old thread, some people detail their experience with testosterone replacement therapy that fixed their chronic CH. Very interesting
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