How Ketamine Can Help with Chronic Migraines

Pain of any kind has a way of commanding all of your attention, and that’s certainly true of migraine, which the 1 billion people around the world who report migraines can confirm.

Closer to home, 3%-5% of the US population suffers from chronic migraines, which we define as having 15 days or more of head pain each month — and that’s half your life or more!

If you’re tired of living under the constant threat of migraines, and you feel like you’ve exhausted your options, it could be time to explore whether ketamine can aid in your effort to reclaim your life from chronic head pain.

Here at Charlotte Ketamine Center, Dr. Neal Taub and the team are having great success using ketamine therapy to address issues from anxiety to chronic daily headaches and migraines.

In this month’s blog post, we dive into how ketamine can bring you much-needed relief from your chronic migraines.

About those chronic migraines

One of the more frustrating aspects of chronic migraines is there’s no magic bullet to treat this common neurological disorder. Since we don’t yet know the exact cause-and-effect mechanism behind migraines, we don’t have a cure, which makes management key.

If you’re reading this, we’re sure you’ve tried your fair share of migraine therapies, from managing your triggers and prescription medications to biofeedback and acupuncture. 

Whether you’ve tried all these or just a couple, you’re here because your migraines continue to cause you trouble.

Ketamine for chronic, treatment-resistant migraines

The longer you have migraines, the more likely it is that your brain and neural pathways continue in this dysfunction — your pain pathways are well-worn and become easily fired up.

With ketamine, our goal is to break the cycle by blocking the pain pathways. Ketamine acts as a N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor antagonist, essentially meaning it blocks pain signals. Ketamine may also have anti-inflammatory properties that can help reduce head pain.

Not only can ketamine make quick work of a migraine that’s already taken hold, but it may also help form newer and healthier neural pathways that don’t favor pain.

One small study concluded that, for migraines, “Ketamine infusions hold potential to reduce short-term pain and ‘break the cycle’ of constant symptoms.”

Another study that focused on intranasal ketamine for chronic migraine found that nearly half of users reported that intranasal was “very effective” and that their quality of life was considerably better as a result.

Our experiences here at our practice mirror those findings, and we’ve helped many patients break free from chronic and treatment-resistant migraines with ketamine therapy.

If you want to join our growing list of satisfied and pain-free patients, we invite you to call our office in Charlotte, North Carolina, at 704-519-6918 to schedule a ketamine consultation.