For cluster headaches, oxygen is good medicine, study finds

"Cluster headache is probably the most severe pain known to humans. Most female patients describe each attack as worse than childbirth."

You’d think that such an excruciating condition would require some mighty strong medicine. But a study coming out today in the Journal of the American Medical Assn. -- the source of the statement above -- concludes that cluster headaches can be treated by inhaling pure 100% oxygen.

Cluster headaches affect about 0.3% of the general population, according to the study. The National Institutes of Health says the debilitating headaches can strike daily for weeks at a time. Other sources say the bouts can last for months before patients go into remission.

Migraine drugs such as Imitrex (sumatriptan) are typically prescribed to stop the pain, but there are limits on daily usage. A small study of 15 patients has found that inhaling high-flow oxygen for 15 minutes was helpful. A trio of researchers from the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in London decided to test the therapy more rigorously.

They found 76 patients who suffered cluster headaches and treated them for four attacks. They were asked to inhale either pure oxygen or normal air (which includes 21% oxygen) through a face mask for 15 minutes. Neither the patients nor the providers knew which odorless, colorless gas was being administered.

But there was a difference. When asked to rate their pain relief, 78% of patients said they felt fine within 15 minutes of breathing high-flow pure oxygen. By contrast, only 20% of patients had the same response after being treated with high-flow regular air. Oxygen continued to outperform air at 30 and 60 minutes after the onset of the attack, according to the study. The researchers didn’t report any serious adverse effects.

The study was funded in part by Linde Industrial Gases, a German supplier of industrial and medical gases. One of the study’s authors disclosed that he had served on a Linde advisory board about the use of oxygen to treat cluster headaches.

-- Karen Kaplan

Photo illustration: Excruciating headache? Oxygen may help. Credit: Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times

Comments

[Dave Mallegg]

Extra oxygen is also great for so many things, under the proper controlled medical supervision, such as exercising with oxygen, hyberbaric oxygen chambers as well as maintaining optimum oxygen levels in your blood. For more info go to: http://davemallegg.com

[Jim Miller]

Props to JAMA for publishing this. Cluster headaches are by far the worst pain I've ever experienced--makes dental pain seem like a pin prick in comparison. 100% oxygen in a controlled setting eliminated my headache pain almost immediately without the side effects that accompany heavy-duty narcotics and the cost that comes with the ER visit at 2AM.

[Gordon Hill]

Yes, but just try to buy a little bit of oxygen...it takes a $200 doctors visit and $400 dollars a month for a prescription of oxygen...

I'm surprised your story didn't mention this!

[Delta Sierra]

Old news.

[Mindy S.]

Not exactly new- 20 years ago a doctor at UC recommended that I try it for my cluster headaches, but I chose acupuncture instead and have been virtually headache-free since. Acupuncture rules, those headaches were one of the most hellish experiences imaginable.

[Kathy Rothman]

My father suffered profoundly from cluster headaches when he was in his late forties and early fifties. Desperate for help, he participated in a biofeedback experiment at Menninger’s Clinic in Topeka, Kansas over 35 years ago. That was where he learned to raise the temperature in his hands around eight degrees, which, for some reason, completely stopped the pain associated with the headaches. Unlike O2 therapy it was free and, once the technique was learned, no equipment was needed. Yet we hear very little about biofeedback these days for the treatment of headaches--or anything else, for that matter. I wonder why not?