Cluster Headaches
Cluster headaches occur in cyclical patterns or clusters — which gives the condition of its name. Cluster headache is one of the most painful types of headache. Cluster headache is sometimes called the "alarm clock headache" because it commonly awakens you in the middle of the night with intense pain in or around the eye on one side of your head. The bouts of frequent attacks may last from weeks to months. When drug treatment fails, an invasive nerve stimulation procedure shows promise. Cluster headaches have been treated by ablation of the trigeminal nerve, but have not been very effective. Other surgical treatments for cluster headaches are under investigation.
Read more about this topic: Ablative Brain Surgery, Uses
Famous quotes containing the words cluster and/or headaches:
“the green hells of the sea
Where fallen skies and evil hues and eyeless creatures be;
On them the sea-valves cluster and the grey sea-forests curl,
Splashed with a splended sickness, the sickness of the pearl;”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“George Peatty: Tell me something, wouldya Sherry? Just tell me one thing. Why did you ever marry me anyway?
Sherry Peatty: Oh, George. When a man has to ask his wife that, well, he just hadn’t better, that’s all. Why talk about it? Maybe it’s all to the good in the long run. After all, if people didn’t have headaches what would happen to the aspirin industry?”
—Stanley Kubrick (b. 1928)