HealthWatch: Electrode Treatment For Migraines

Migraine headaches are a real, biological disease characterized by throbbing head pain – usually on one side of the head – sometimes paired with nausea or sensitivity to light or sound.

While new medications help, some are still debilitated by their headaches – but now there's a possible alternative. "It's a really sharp, intense pain [and] a lot of nausea," migraine sufferer Rebecca Scott says. "Sometimes it's above my eyes, sometimes it radiates all the way through the top and the back of my head."

Rebecca, a 32-year-old mother of two, gets debilitating headaches three or four times a week, each lasting anywhere from eight hours to three days long.

The migraines have made it difficult for her to hold down a job, and even to be a mom.

"It's hard when your kids want to go out and play," Rebecca says. "They want me to jump on a trampoline with them, they want me to play sports with them, and I can't do that."

When drugs failed, Rebecca came to New York from her home in North Carolina to see Dr. Alon Mogilner, who's running an experimental trial using electrodes and a nerve stimulator to treat migraines.

The electrodes are placed below the base of the skull, and then connected to a battery-powered pulse generator. "

One of the theories is that stimulation of particular nerves in the upper neck and the back of the head can actually send signals back to parts of the brain that control the pain signals," Dr. Mogilner, of North Shore Long Island Jewish Health System, says. "The signals that are sent to the blood vessels in the brain and head, may be, in fact, causing the migraines."

The actual implant procedure is fairly simple – the electrodes are placed under the skin at the back of the neck, under X-ray guidance.

Rebecca is even awake for part of the surgery to check electrode placement.

The hope is that the nerve stimulation will make migraines less frequent milder. "

If it's affecting the quality of my life, then why not take a chance at it," Rebecca says.

Even though the stimulator implant is relatively minor as far as surgical procedures go, the clinical trial is meant for people who suffer migraines at least three to four days a week.

The technology itself has been around for years, being used as a stimulator in treatment for Parkinson's, Dystonia, and for chronic back pain.

(CBS)