The effect of Classical homeopathy on headache

Background: Due to some of mechanisms of headache including central sensitization,

hypersensitivity and vasodilatation we preferred using homeopathy with dynamic

mechanisms of for migraine and TTH headache.

Methods. Pain characters, mental symptoms and behaviors were assessed to find

appropriated remedies for patients by considering the layers of dynamisms by homeopath

physician. Demographic data, severity of head pain, sleep complaints, anger and allergy were

gathered from their paper files and were analysis by SPSS 22.

Result: 40 migraine or TTH patients with mean age of 36.12 ± 11.9 yrs and pain duration of

100 months. Primary outcome after 3 months was significant decrease of pain intensity in 6

(15%) and improvement in 10 (24%) of patients. After median of 12 months of homeopathic

treatment, pain intensity significantly decreased in 24 (60%) and improved in 9 (22.5%) of

patients. Sleep problems and anger were change positively in 52 and 51 percent of patients.

Conclusion: The use of homeopathy may be effective in the treatment of migraines and

THH. It is possible that offer homeopathy as a more practical and effective approach for

headache. More studying are suggested for effects of homeopathy on headache and its

phenomena.

Keyword: Headache, Migraine, Tension-type headache, Homeopathy

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Introduction:

Many people of world suffered of any kind of headaches and need effective treatments.

Headache was the sixth highest cause worldwide of years lost due to disability (YLD) in

2013. Headache disorders collectively were third highest. (1) 14.2 percent of adults reported

having migraine or severe headache in the previous 3 months especially in females 18-44 yrs.

(2). There is an emerge in headache in puberty also. Migraine attacks and Tension-type

headache are the most common primary headache disorders. Attacks of migraine typically

include of moderate or severe intensity, one-sided, pulsating in quality, duration of hours to

2-3 days and aggravated by routine physical activity. Tension-type headache generally is

stress-related or associated with musculoskeletal problems. (3)

The 1-year prevalence of migraine in age range 12-65 years in Tehran was 27.6%. (4) Head

pain mechanisms in migraine includes genetic, central sensitization of trigeminal

hypersensitivity of nociceptive pathways, meningeal inflammation and vasodilatation. (5)

Many factors aggravate this pain such as anxiety, poor sleep and stress, medication overuse,

and poor self-efficacy. (6) Migraine is strongly associated with anxiety and mood disorders,

allergies, chronic pain (7) and sleep disorders (8). Lund find 18.1% concurrent headache and

sleep problems in Denmark. It was higher among women and lower quality of life people

than only headache or only sleep problems. Exline evaluated spiritual aspect of headache. In

his study 37.5 % of sample (30 Patients admitted for treatment for Chronic Headaches)

endorsed some anger toward God that correlated with their emotional distress. (9)

So homeopaths must to care all aspects of patients (holistic care) and know many methods to

select more appropriate for each patient. One of complementary medicine methods that are

used for treatment of headache is Homeopathy. Homeopathy is a traditional European

medical practice in which a specific health problem is treated by the ingestion of minute

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amount of a substance that, in large amount, might cause the same problem in a healthy

individual. (10-11) Homeopathic remedies are prepared by diluting and potentiating a

substance, such as an herbal extract, mineral, or animal tissue, in water and alcohol. The

substance is successively diluted to one-tenth or one-hundredth of the original and is

vigorously shaken between dilutions. The theoretical principles of homeopathy derive from

clinical observation, some research demonstrating efficacy; however much research still

needs to be done in order to elucidate its mechanisms of action. (12) This method describe

philosophically as balance between health and illness by system of vital force. If this system

is disturbed (by either physical, emotional, or energetic events), then the biological

machinery can become disturbed, leading to illness. Based on the principle “no two similar

disease entities can simultaneously exist in an individual,” the vital human forces which have

fallen out of balance are restored to normal, resulting in resolution of disease symptoms. (13-

15) Some researches show the phenomena of potentization relate to changing in resonance of

water molecules. (16) Molecular and cellular mechanisms were studied frequently by

experimental methods. (Examples 17-18) Homeopathy has many advantages for human

health even if use for pain especially it’s very low side effects, gentle effectiveness, correct

the root cause of the illness, treatment the patient as a whole and not just the disease, with

long lasting remission. (19)

There are challenges in the headache treatment and sometimes it become severe or chronic.

Severe case may refer to emergency centers and gave corticosteroids a group of

immunosuppressive drugs with many side effects and little effect on relapse. (20)

Some new treatment can improve head pain such as: Amiloride, a blocker of epithelial

sodium channels, folic acid (5 mg/d) plus pyridoxine (80 mg/d), autologous adipose-derived

stromal vascular fraction (8 cases), botulinum toxin type A and nutraceuticals such as Co

q10. (21-25)

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Headache, musculoskeletal pains, and anxiety were the commonest symptoms in homeopathy

users in a study in Portuguese and in Isfahan also. (27, 28) Here is some cases of headache

that were treated by homeopathy in Isfahan as a successful method.

Methods: In the Cross sectional study for Clinical Audit Report, Data of patients of

homeopathy clinic were collected. The physician evaluated type and causes (triggers) of

headache and used homeopathy for tension and migraine type in association with their other

symptoms. Standard of diagnosis was compatible with the International Classification of

Headache Disorders. Most of them were evaluated by essential blood tests and some of

patients by brain imaging. Some of them were treated by neurologist before refer to

homeopathy clinic. The homeopath asked them localization, severity, frequency and quality

of headache, mental symptoms and behaviors and prescribed appropriated remedies to them

by considering the layers of dynamisms. In every visit he prescribed two to five dilutes

remedies for using at home in reasonable intervals. He defined remedy dose by patient's

sensitivities, educated the patients as much as possible and facilitate to asking their questions

by phone. He prescribe psoric, nonpsoric and Shouslers remedies intermittently. He

Integrated homeopathy and conventional therapies so they can to continuous their anti-

headache drugs until remission by homeopathy in frequency or severity and use them in acute

situations including simple analgesics. The patients considered frequency, severity and

analgesic use for physician to record clinical changes in each visit. Demographic data,

headache type, remedies, severity of head pain, sleep complaints, anger and allergy were

gathered from the paper files and were analysis by SPSS 22.

Results: Forty patients (36 female and 4 male) were treated by homeopathy and interviewed

about course and remission of their symptoms since 2012 to 2017. Mean age was 36.12 ±

11.9 yrs (Range of 12-62 years) and duration of pain was 100.9 ± 80 months. They continued

to taking homeopathic remedies for 12.22 ± 9 months. Their diagnosis include migraine 50%,

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Tension type (TTH) 17.5% and both 32.5%. Mean score of severity of headache was 2.5±0.6

and of anger was 1.85± 0.65(out of 4). Severity of the symptoms are listed in table 1.

Response of headache to this method are shown in figures 1 and 2 . Nineteen patients suffer

of insomnia that their response to homeopathy are shown in figure 3.

15.15 percent of 33 patients reported very good and 36 percent good response to their anger

symptom. Eight patients suffer of allergic diseases most rhinitis and 6 of them become good.

Staph, Sulphur, Calc.c, Nat.m, Bell, Phos, Apis, Spig, Coloc and Sepia 30C and sometimes

200C are most common remedies were used for these patients in the clinic. KP and NM

Shousler were used more also.

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 Table 1: Severity of the symptoms of patient before homeopathy.

Severity/Absent Mild Moderate severe Very Absent Total

severe
Headache Frequency 0 22 16 2 0 40
Percent 0 55 40 5 0 100
Anger Frequency 10 20 5 0 5 40
Percent 25 50 12.5 0 12.5 100
Sleep Frequency 6 12 2 0 20 40
Percent 15 30 5 0 50 100
derangement
Allergy Frequency 2 6 2 0 30 40
Percent 5 15 5 0 75 100

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Discussion: Improvement in headache patients in these series of patients was favorable and

indicate for using homeopathy in the treatment of headache dynamically without risk of side

effects. In addition, homeopathy has advantage of well change of other illnesses of these

patients. This study showed that longtime treatment had more benefit effects on headache.

There are many studies indicate effectiveness of homeopathy on headache. Dunstant fox

assessed 43 patients with migraine headache after homeopathic treatment and diet

recommendation by self-report. His results showed that 56% were well subsequently and

32% didn’t need drugs again for their pain. He used 69 remedies for them and more patients

were satisfied at 4 weeks after beginning of treatment. (28) Whitmarsh fallowed 77 patients

that received homeopathy or placebo in the RCT for 12 weeks. Results indicate that 30

percent will benefit after one year of treatment. (29)

One year follow-up and single case time series analysis for the effects of homeopathic

treatment of chronic headaches showed good response to homeopathy also. (30) Mojaver

treated 15 trigeminal neuralgia patients (10 females) who referred to the Oral Medicine Clinic

of Tehran University. He used pulsatilla, Aconite, sulphur, nat.m and mag.p more frequent

remedies. Pain intensity decreased from 9.9 to 1.23 score at 4th month of homeopathy. (31)

Some placebo-controlled studies have demonstrated the effectiveness of homeopathic

remedies for headache or brain injuries to be equal to placebos (32). There was also a trend

for increased likelihood of visits to homeopaths (p<0.1) persons 60 years and over, social

welfare recipients and having a chronic complaint. (33) The effect of homeopathy on

depression was studied on 377 depressed patient, by using PHQ-over 6.5 months and 526

prescriptions (median per patient 7.0) at 12 months. The offer group reported a 1.4-point

lower mean depression score than the no offer group. (34) Some effects for rheumatologic

disease were reported also. (35) There are many CAM method for treatment of headache also

(36). Acupuncture was effective in recent studies. (37-38)

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Every physician use these methods must be cautious about true diagnosis of dangerous

Secondary Causes of headache such as brain tumors or SAH by good evaluation first

clinically and then with preclinical methods. (39)

Phenomena of allergy has some similarity to mediator release in migraine. In my study

improvement of allergy was observed in headache patients. In one study immunotherapy for

subjects ≤ 45 years of age, was associated with decreased migraine frequency and disability.

(40) Transcranial magnetic stimulation cause beta endorphin and decrease headache (41) and

there are some data for releasing of nortrasmitters by homeopathy also. (42) Homeopathy

treated insomnia in headache patients. Sleep problems are usually associated with headache.

Baseline insomnia was associated with a 40% increased risk for headache, The RR was larger

for migraine than TTH. (43) Headache, comorbid symptoms and its triggers were managed

by patient centered practice and homeopathy. Homeopathy has feasibility to use for wellness

also. Rhee fined that homeopathy users for wellness had higher likelihood of reporting

benefits. (44) More studying for effects of homeopathy on headache and its phenomena

suggest.

Acknowledgement: I would like to thanks of gratitude to my department rand faculty

managers that gave me an opportunity to practice and research homeopathic medicine and

prepare this article. I thanks of patients because they accepted this method and continuous it.

Conflinst of interest: I haven’t any conflict of interest about results of the article.

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