Chronic migraine headaches plagued Adam Pressley from childhood, and by his 30s they had become a near-daily occurrence.

Pressley, 31, had tried everything to stop them: blood pressure drugs, antidepressants, seizure medications, and even quarterly injections of Botox.

Nerve-releasing plastic surgery

Then his doctor suggested something surprising, saying plastic surgery could potentially relieve nerve pressure that was contributing to the headaches.

“I kind of thought it was crazy, a plastic surgery procedure that could help people with their migraines,” said Pressley, who lives in Clarksville, Tennessee. “I was both sceptical and happy at the same time.”

The use of nerve-releasing plastic surgery to treat migraine has been around for a couple of decades, and the procedure is becoming more common and more effective, said Dr Salam Kassis, a plastic surgeon at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, Tennessee.

Clinical research now indicates that about half of the people who undergo surgery to release entrapped nerves will experience complete relief from migraines, and another 40% will have fewer and less severe headaches, he said.

“Over the last 20 years, our percentages have improved dramatically. The success rate is even better than it was a decade ago,” Kassis said.

Not all headache experts are sold on the procedure, however.

“Certainly, there are some cases where this might be helpful, but it’s not something I generally recommend in my practice,” said Dr Rachel Colman, an assistant professor of neurology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, in New York City.

Pressley started having migraines at age nine, and their frequency increased from about once a month in childhood to nearly every day.

Connection discovered by chance

“They can darn near incapacitate me,” he said. Noise and light become unbearable, his vision gets blurry, and the pain makes him nauseous.

Pressley, a computer science student, recently finished a six-year stint with the US Army, where he warned new commanding officers that he suffered severe migraines five to seven days a week.

He learned about the plastic surgery procedure from Kassis, who spoke to him during one of his regular Botox treatments, and decided it was worth a try.

Migraines generally are thought of as originating in the brain, but research has shown that some people might suffer the headaches due to compression of nerves running through the head and neck, Kassis said.

The connection was discovered by chance, he said.

“Plastic surgeons perform cosmetic procedures like brow lifts and resection of the frown muscles, and patients who had these types of surgeries had been coming in for follow-up appointments saying, ‘I feel so great, even my migraines went away,'” Kassis said.

It’s the same concept as carpal tunnel surgery to release nerves trapped in the wrist, he explained.

Outpatient procedure

The procedure also follows the same logic as treating migraine with Botox, Kassis said.

“The way Botox works is it causes the muscles to stop working and shrink, so the nerve will have more space and decompress,” he said.

Pressley had the nerve-releasing surgery last November. It’s a one- to two-hour outpatient procedure.

Three days later, he was back at work and school, albeit with a face so swollen that, he said, it “looked like I just lost a fight to a bear.”

The migraine relief was both immediate and substantial.

“After I had the surgery, I didn’t have a migraine for almost a month and a half. I still do have migraines but they’re substantially decreased,” Pressley said.

He averages one migraine every three to four weeks these days.

More and more common

“The day-to-day migraines I was getting – the ones that kept me from enjoying life – are out of my life,” Pressley said.

Nerve-releasing surgery is mainly practised at a handful of medical centres across the country, but use of the procedure is becoming more widespread, Kassis said.

“There are so many more people learning it now, and it is becoming more and more common,” he said.

The average cost of migraine surgery is $5,000 to $15,000 (±R76 000 to R220 000), according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons.

Ideal candidates for the procedure can identify one or more trigger points on the face or neck where their migraine pain begins, Kassis said. They also suffer from migraines that are poorly controlled by medications.

Works on pain receptors

Colman said research supporting the procedure has generally been conducted by plastic surgeons and other types of specialists, rather than neurologists.

“I’m not as convinced by the current data we have that this is ‘generalise-able’ or very efficacious for most patients,” she said.

She added that Botox shouldn’t be used to explain why the surgery should work. That’s because while Botox does cause muscles to relax, it also works directly on pain receptors in the brain to relieve migraines.

“Botox works for chronic migraine above and beyond the muscle,” Colman said. “My preference would be that if Botox helps in these patients, use Botox rather than going to a surgical procedure.”

^{Image credit: iStock}

A health board says four of its hospitals were “at a level of escalation not seen before”.

Moms trump doctors when it comes to pregnancy advice, a new study suggests.

More often than not, pregnant women rely on guidance from their mothers instead of medical experts, the researchers found.

Many believe their mom’s advice is as good or even better than medical recommendations.

“And often for good reason,” said study author Danielle Bessett, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Cincinnati.

“Generational disconnect”

Bessett interviewed pregnant women and their mothers while following the younger women for their entire pregnancy.

“I found that most pregnancy self-help books, best known for their month-by-month guidance on foetal development and lifestyle coaching, are also emphatic about following medical advice exclusively over what they consider the outdated advice of a mother or friend,” Bessett said.

This promotes a “generational disconnect” between pregnant women and their mothers.

“This advice is limited and can result in an increased level of stress and discomfort for some soon-to-be moms,” Bessett said.

Mom listens more

The link between pregnant women and their mothers during pregnancy was strongest among minorities and women with less than a college degree who had little trust in their health care providers.

“It was not the case at all that these mothers were anti-science or against medicine, but for minority women and those with lower levels of education, there is clear evidence of not being listened to or feeling cared for by physicians and clinics as much as pregnant women with higher education,” Bessett said.

“This all ties back to why women with lower education might be relying more on their mothers – because their moms listen to them more,” she explained.

Despite being more likely to heed medical advice, women with higher levels of education still turned to their mothers for certain types of help, the study found.

“They leaned more on their doctors for advice about what to eat and what tests to have, but turned to their moms for advice on child care and for emotional support, and talked a lot about the ways in which bodies change as a result of pregnancy,” Bessett said.

The study was published recently in the journal Reproduction, Health, and Medicine (Advances in Medical Sociology).

^{Image credit: iStock}

Vitamin D deficiency is linked with poor muscle health in older adults, a new study finds. Maintaining muscle health helps seniors maintain their independence, mobility and quality of life. It also lowers their risk of falls and frailty.

Researchers looked at more than 4,100 people, aged 60 and older, in England. About 4 in 10 with vitamin D deficiency had muscle weakness – twice the level found among those who had adequate vitamin D levels.

Impaired muscle performance was three times more common among those with vitamin D deficiency (25.2%) than those with adequate vitamin D (7.9%).

Further analysis showed that vitamin D deficiency significantly increased the odds of impaired muscle strength and performance.

The study also confirmed the benefits of exercise. Participants who got regular moderate physical activity were much less likely to have poor muscle strength and physical performance, according to the researchers at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland.

“Maintaining muscle function is incredibly important, and often overlooked, in promoting healthy aging,” said researcher Maria O’Sullivan, an associate professor in nutrition. “Addressing this through multimodal approaches that incorporate physical activity, reversing vitamin D deficiency and other modifiable diet and lifestyle components require further investigation.”

First author Niamh Aspell, who did her doctoral studies at Trinity, said the findings support the need for public health strategies to eliminate vitamin D deficiency in older people.

“Future research, however, should identify and focus on older adults with vitamin D deficiency and aim to better understand if reversing this deficiency improves skeletal muscle function,” she said in a college news release.

Study co-author Eamon Laird, a research fellow at Trinity, said Finland is among countries that have all but eliminated deficiency in the population by fortifying food with vitamin D. “Such a policy could similarly be implemented in the UK and Ireland for older populations,” he said.

The findings were recently published in the journal Clinical Interventions in Ageing.

^{Image credit: iStock}

Isla is thought to be the only person in the world with the condition, that accelerates the ageing of cells.

While you can take Social Security benefits at age 62 and get 75% of your maximum, waiting until you reach full retirement age (between age 66 and 67 depending on the year you were born) gets you much closer to the full amount. But the age at which Americans can collect the most dollars has inched up to 70.

The problem is that, in general, people today aren’t as healthy during their pre-retirement years as past generations were.

Having one or more chronic health conditions, from diabetes to arthritis, can make it harder to keep working through your 60s and, for those who want or need to, beyond.

Though you might see retirement as being in the distant future, taking care of yourself today creates the foundation for a healthier and more productive old age. The American Academy of Family Physicians has seven key lifestyle habits to follow that can get you there.

Build the Foundation for Lifelong Fitness

• Eat healthy: fruit, vegetables, legumes, nuts, whole grains and lean proteins.
• Get regular exercise – on nearly every day of the week.
• Lose weight if you’re overweight.
• Protect your skin every time you leave your home to help prevent skin cancer.
• Don’t smoke.
• Limit alcohol to a max of one drink a day for women, two for men. Less is better.
• Practice safe sex.

Map out a long-term strategy with your health care provider that includes the number of daily calories and minutes of exercise appropriate for you.

And make sure you’re getting regular preventive care, such as screenings for blood pressure and cholesterol and, depending on your age, breast, colon and other cancers.

^{Image credit: iStock}

Annie Wells says measures including decriminalisation and introducing “fix rooms” should be considered.

Determining if you have a cold, the flu or an allergy can be difficult when you’re having common symptoms, such as sneezing or a sore throat.

The common symptoms reflect that each condition affects your respiratory system, says the National Institutes of Health.

While both colds and flus can cause congestion, cough and sore throat, the flu has unique symptoms. The flu can cause high fever, headache, fatigue, and aches. These symptoms are less common in people with a cold.

Allergies can cause itchy, watery eyes, which aren’t typical symptoms of a cold or flu. Usually, allergy symptoms last as long as you’re exposed to the trigger. A cold or the flu rarely lasts more than two weeks.

^{Image credit: iStock}

A mysterious illness is not caused by the virus that killed hundreds in 2002-03, officials said.