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Subject: headache/migraine


http://news.excite.com/news/r/010928/18/health-iron
                                      
   Iron Imbalance in Brain May Cause Migraine
   Updated: Fri, Sep 28 6:22 PM EDT
   
   By Will Boggs, MD
   
   NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Abnormalities in the way the brain's pain
   control center handles iron may lead to the development of migraine
   attacks and headaches, according to a study by Kansas researchers.
   
   During migraine, a portion of the brain known as the periaqueductal
   gray matter (PAG) may fail to "switch on" to prevent pain, Dr. K.
   Michael Welch of the University of Kansas Medical Center in Kansas
   City told Reuters Health.
   
   "In migraine, a trigger such as stress activates the PAG but it does
   not switch on because it is dysfunctional," he explained, "or else
   switches on an abnormal part."
   
   The result? "Pain instead of no pain," according to Welch.
   
   His team studied levels of iron in the PAG of patients with either
   migraine headaches or recurrent, non-migraine headaches and compared
   them to levels in people without headache or migraine.
   
   Changes in iron levels can reflect changes in the way the cells of the
   PAG work, the authors pointed out.
   
   According to the report, published in a recent issue of the journal
   Headache, iron levels in the PAG were significantly increased in
   patients with migraine and those with headache compared to the
   headache-free group.
   
   In fact, the researchers pointed out, the longer patients had
   experienced headaches, the higher the iron levels in the PAG were,
   though iron levels at the beginning of their illness were still
   clearly higher than normal.
   
   Increased iron levels may be both a cause of migraine attacks and a
   result of repeated headaches, the investigators noted.
   
   "Thus, we believe that the increased (iron levels) in our migraine
   groups reflect impaired iron (balance), possibly associated with
   (nerve) dysfunction or damage," the authors concluded.
   
   "Perhaps the PAG abnormality is essential to the cause of the headache
   in migraine," Welch said. "The gradual deposition of iron increases
   dysfunction, and headaches coalesce from episodic to continuous."
   
   How, then, might one minimize the damage from increased iron stores?
   Welch advised, "Treat episodes quickly and prevent (attacks) whenever
   possible."
   
   SOURCE: Headache 2001;41:629-637.
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Subject: chelate/aspirin

   
   Med Hypotheses 1998 Mar;50(3):239-51
   
A chelate theory for the mechanism of action of aspirin-like drugs.

    Wang X
    
   Department of Pathology, Cornell University Medical College, New York,
   NY 10021, USA. xwang@mail.med.cornell.edu
   
   Two hundred years after the discovery of the pharmaceutical usefulness
   of aspirin, it and aspirin-like drugs, a family with an
   ever-increasing number of members, are an indispensable part of modern
   life. However, the question as to how these drugs work in the body has
   remained unsettled. It is postulated here that this group of drugs may
   exert their therapeutic (and adverse) effects by chelating various
   physiologically important metallic cations in the body. The chelate
   theory is supported by the vast majority, if not all, of the
   observations on these drugs made in the past.
   
   Publication Types:
     * Review
     * Review, academic
       
   PMID: 9578329, UI: 98237440
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