Can Your Migraine Headache Disorder Be Cured?
If we are going to determine if migraine headaches can be permanently cured we must first do a little detective work. The best place to start is by defining our main terms, “migraine” and “cure,” and see where it takes us. Once we have defined our terms we can then decide if migraines are curable according to accepted medical definitions.
According to any standard dictionary, medical or otherwise, “migraine” is typically defined as a condition that is marked by recurrent severe headache, usually unilateral, and often accompanied by nausea and vomiting. The cause of migraine is not known, but appears to be precipitated by dilation (enlargement) of intracranial blood vessels.
The word “cure” is defined as a means of healing or restoring to health. It is a method or course of medical treatment used to restore health. It is also the remission of signs and symptoms of a disease, especially during a prolonged period of observation.
Now that we have defined our terms we need to look at these definitions more closely. It is very obvious what a migraine headache is as described above. A migraine headache is a headache that is usually one-sided and often accompanied by nausea and vomiting. It also appears to be caused when blood vessels surrounding the brain become enlarged. I’m sure we can all agree that this definition of migraine is accurate. Our next step is to take a closer look at the word “cure” to see if it’s actually possible, according to accepted medical definitions, to cure migraine.
“Cure” is a means of healing or restoring health. In other words, if someone’s health is causing them to experience migraine headaches, restoring their health to a point where they no longer experience migraine headaches will cure them of the disorder.
The word “cure” also means a remission of signs or symptoms of a disease especially during a prolonged period of observation. As an example, if a person suffers with migraine headaches and does something which improves their health and results in a prolonged period where they have no migraine symptoms, they have been cured of migraine.
As a real world example, let’s take a look at a specific example to see if we can come up with a definite answer to the question “can migraines be cured?”
A migraine trigger is any factor that leads to an acute migraine attack in people who are prone to develop migraine headaches. Common triggers are caffeine, nitrates, alcohol, and many others.
If a migraine sufferer gets a headache each time they consume caffeine, what would happen if they no longer consumed caffeine? If caffeine consumption is the cause of that person’s headaches, and they stopped consuming caffeine, the headaches would disappear. And according to the definitions of the terms migraine and cure, as long as this person stopped consuming caffeine and experienced a remission of their symptoms for a prolonged period of time, they would be cured of migraine.
This was a simple example using triggers as the cause of migraine attacks. However, it doesn’t matter what causes a migraine attack. If a person’s health can be restored to a point where migraine attacks no longer occur, they have cured their migraine disorder according to the accepted definitions of the terms.
