Sensory function in cluster headache: an observational study comparing the symptomatic and asymptomatic sides

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Quite a technical article, although fairly short.

In essence the research tested a group of people with CH to determine their reaction to sensations on the side of the body which matches the side of the head where they experience CH and the opposite side. The results show that people were more sensitive on the CH symptom side compared to the non-symptom side.

Now what is interesting is that the locations tested included:

• Parts of the trigeminal nerve - you'd expect this to be more sensitive since this nerve is a key part of the CH response
• Other locations including the cervical spine (neck area of the spine) and the thenar eminence (group of muscles around the base of the thumb) - you wouldn't normally expect these to be impacted

Clearly CH isn't as simple as the trigeminal nerve alone being triggered to cause intense pain, plus the associated symptoms around the nose / eye area.

Now I remember a few years ago someone posted about helping their CH with a rubber band around one of the fingers of their hand. Now it might just be that they were onto something!

Mike,

My gammaCore is applied to the neck on the pain side, so that part of the article makes sense to me.

Never thought about the hand though.

Thanks for circulating this.

Peter.

Next CH attack, try clamping your thumb in a vice and belting it with a hammer. Not very practical, but I doubt CH attack would be anyone's principal concern when doing this. It's the theory behind Neuromodulation, so a Professor explained to me...