A study has identified a link between poor sleep and migraine attacks, suggesting that improving sleep hygiene may help to diminish migraine attacks in people with the debilitating headaches.
The study from the University of Arizona Health Sciences’ Comprehensive Center for Pain & Addiction found sleep disturbances can increase vulnerability to migraine attacks, yet the opposite is not true.
Many people with migraine report having sleeping disorders, including insomnia, trouble falling or staying asleep, poor sleep quality, excessive daytime sleepiness, waking up from sleep and being forced to sleep because of a migraine headache. Until now, it was unknown whether migraine causes poor sleep or vice versa.
The research team used pre-clinical mouse models to evaluate sleep disruption, as the sleep architecture of mice closely matches that of people.
This includes mice having cycles of deep sleep, REM sleep and light sleep. Sleep was assessed using electroencephalogram recordings and visual observations.
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The paper, published in the journal Brain Communications, found that, when mice were sleep deprived, they were more likely to experience migraine-like pain, but migraine-like pain did not disrupt normal sleep.
“It has been recognised for quite a long time that there is a relationship between sleep and migraine,” said principal investigator Frank Porreca, research director for the Comprehensive Center for Pain & Addiction and professor of pharmacology at the University Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson.
“The way it has been investigated in the past has been through patient-reported information, which is subjective. We quantitatively measured sleep in preclinical models and found that migraine-like pain does not influence sleep, but if you have disrupted sleep, your chances of having a migraine attack if you’re a migraine patient are much higher,” he added.
Porreca noted that sleep deprivation can happen for many reasons, including stress. For this study, the research team therefore ensured they were studying the effect of sleep, and not stress, on migraine by giving mice novel objects to explore to keep them awake.
“Mice are compelled to explore novel objects. They just have to go and look,” Porreca said. “It reminds me of how teenagers are often sleep deprived because they’re on their phones. Anybody who studies sleep will tell you that from a sleep hygiene point of view, you don’t want any devices in your bedroom where you’re trying to sleep.”
For people with migraine, limiting the use of electronic devices before bedtime and following other sleep health tips could be an easy way to limit the likelihood of migraine attacks.
“Early morning is one of the most common times people experience migraine attacks,” Porreca said. “Migraine is highly female prevalent – it’s three to one, women to men – and almost all the women are of childbearing age.
“Many people with migraine probably have children. They wake up with a migraine attack and are immediately stressed. They don’t have time to take care of themselves, they have to get the kids ready for school and they have to get ready for work. That migraine attack is happening in the worst time of the day for function. Improved sleep is critically important and probably would diminish the frequency of migraine attacks,” Porreca added.
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