With the daily stresses associated with busy schedules, college students may be more prone to stress-induced migraines.
Michigan Headache and Neurological Institute’s director and founder Joel Saper said migraines are a brain biological disorder that have a genetic basis and involve a cascade of neurophysiological changes when provoked.
Pain is only one part, Saper said, but it is often the most dramatic part.
While there are many people whose headaches occur during periods of stress, interestingly, a huge number of people get their attacks after the stress, he said.This pain can come before or after the provoking factor, which is commonly stress for young college students.
“In college students ... it’s very common because the stress levels are pretty high, so if you’re stress sensitive, and you have the migraine gene, then you’re going to be a frequent sufferer,” Saper said. “A huge number of our patients are adolescents, high school and college kids.”
Migraines are usually linked with neurological events, such as abdominal pain, fainting, difficulty speaking, weakness, numbness, visual problems and vertigo.
For zoology sophomore Lindsy Marshall, stress migraines come with a strong sensitivity to light, which can affect her daily routine.
“If I’m in a lecture hall I have to put my hands over my eyes and put my head down, or the other day I was at a friends house get ready for a house warming party and I was wearing sunglasses inside and I just looked weird,” Marshall said.
According to a medical study titled “Migraine prevalence, disease burden and the need for preventive therapy,” about 18 percent of U.S. women suffer from migraines, compared to 6 percent of men. Women are more likely to acquire them when estrogen levels fall during menstrual cycles.
Finding the triggering factors are key to prevention, but each individual will be different, Saper said. Common triggers, in addition to stress, can include certain foods, irregular schedules and bright lights.
Saper suggests exercise such as yoga, regular sleep, wake and eating schedules and biofeedback therapy. Doing these activities “doesn’t cure the trait but it lessens the likelihood of triggering them in some individuals,” he said.
Marshall is always looking for new ways to relieve her pain and has found that caffeine, sleep and medication tend to work best.
If symptoms continue to occur, doctors can prescribe rescue and preventative medications. Rescue medications are used when patients feel a migraine coming on, while prevention medications are taken every day to reduce the likelihood of migraines. These are commonly used when patients have migraines more days than they do not because rescue medications are unsafe to take more than twice a week, Saper said.
