If you have been considering getting a dog, add pain management to your list of reasons. According to a study in the journal of Pain Medicine, a therapy dog is a new addition to the pain management team.  According to Dr. Marcus who writes the well know migraine.com blog, “Therapy dogs have been trained to be quiet, calm, and soothing. Therapy dogs undergo extensive training and testing before they can be certified for therapy work. Typical therapy dogs' work involves the dog standing by or sitting with a patient and getting petted. It may not sound like this is much therapy, but studies have proven spending time with a therapy dog produces measureable reductions in stress levels and the body’s stress chemicals.”

More than 45 million Americans suffer from headaches that disrupt their daily routine. Therapeutic Solutions International has developed a Headache Impact Test and Score Sheet to discover the intensity of your headaches.  You can find this on their website, www.nti-tss.com or view it as the attached PDF here. Do you think your headaches disrupt your daily routines?

There has been a lot of talk about “migraine triggers,” including diet, exercise and sleeping habits.  The most controversial is the idea of food triggers. “Although many people believe that some foods may trigger a migraine, the evidence remains a bit fuzzy,” says Elizabeth Loder, MD, MPH, the chief of the Division of Headache and Pain at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Loder points out that it is difficult to track food triggers because different foods may affect people in different ways. There’s also no consensus about how long it might take a dietary culprit to set off a headache so it’s difficult to pin down which foods are the real trouble makers.