| It Is Not As Easy As You Might Think To Diagnose Headaches |
You would think that diagnosing a headache would be one of the simplest things in the world since nearly all adults suffer from headaches and when you suffer from one then you indeed know about it. But, despite the obvious pain, diagnosing a headache can be a bit harder than you may think.
Surprisingly there are no general and definitive tests for use in diagnosing headaches and if you believe that you are suffering from a headache and are feeling pain then all you can do is tell your physician how you feel and it is his job to come up with a diagnosis on the basis of what you say. One significant problem however is that when reporting symptoms descriptions can vary markedly.
Some people are not as communicative as others when talking about what they feel and our often limited vocabulary does not always help us either. Saying that you are experiencing a 'stabbing pain' may seem to be a very expressive description to you but it does not necessarily help your physician very much.
As if all of this was not bad enough diagnosis is made even more difficult because headaches are not all of one type.
Tension headaches which are produced by inflamed facial or neck muscles and dilated head blood vessels amongst other things do not normally get diagnosed by physicians as the majority of people merely treat them with painkillers or simply wait until they fade.
Migraines, by contrast, are more intense and are much more likely to occasion a visit to your physician although even here about half of sufferers do not seek professional help.
Physicians are able to make use of several factors in order to diagnose a specific type of headache and recommend a suitable treatment and, even though the pain felt is subjective, the type of that pain is an indication of the type of headache. For instance, migraines often produce strong pulsating or throbbing sensations whereas in ordinary tension headaches pain is usually more regular and diffuse.
Migraine headaches are also often accompanied by nausea as well as by sensitivity to sound and light, cold extremities and various other signs which sufferers will recognize. And, as these symptoms tend to be roughly identical from one patient to the next, physicians have an objective group of symptoms on which they are able to form a proper diagnosis.
Cluster headaches are typified by an intense pain behind an eye or temple which remains for about 30 minutes to one hour and then returns the following day at approximately the same time. Cluster headaches can go on for several weeks and, once again as they are quite regular, physicians have something to go o when making their diagnosis.
In those cases where headaches are the effect of a serious underlying condition such as a brain tumor, physicians are able to identify this without too much difficulty. For instance, CT or MRI scans can reveal well known brain patterns which can link the headache to the underlying physical problem.
A headache which slowly worsens over time provides physicians with a clue, as do patterns of pain which shift quickly, and this could for instance indicate an aneurysm (a weakened blood vessel) as the root cause.
Diagnosing headaches is a complex business because of many different forms of headache and the wide variety of symptoms. Nevertheless the key is to gather together as much objective information as is possible both from the patient and clinical testing.
TheMigraineHeadacheCenter.com provides specific information about migrane headaches and other related topics such as what causes headaches in morning http://themigraineheadachecenter.com
Article Source: UnArchived Articles
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