If you have suffered any kind of headache, you would have experienced an episode of migraine at some point in your life. According to a report from the National Headache Foundation of America, migraines affects millions of men and women, with women 3 times likely to experience them. A migraine is something more than your regular headache. Migraine is a severe headache coupled with nausea and sometimes vomiting, that generally lasts for hours or couple of days.
Ear piercings as a form of acupuncture has gained quite the momentum in recent years as an effective alternative to provide relief from migraines. This piercing is done in the innermost cartilage of the ear. This body piercing, known as the Daith piercing, mimics acupuncture to hit the pressure points in the ear to lessen the migraine pain. The daith piercing is done in the same part of the ear where an acupuncture needle would be inserted.
So, could an unconventional piercing put an end to the throbbing pain and be a migraine-fixing miracle? Although there is no concrete yes or no, medical practitioners believe that for some people this alternative method can reduce their symptoms and impact of migraines. But it may not be a long-term/ permanent solution. People who have gotten daith piercings have found, rather on accident, improvement in their intensity and frequency of migraine headaches. The discovery stems from the idea that the piercing hits close to the vagus nerve which travels from your brain to other organs. The nerve has the ability to control some of your body’s hormones. And stimulating the vagus nerve have been associated as a way to treat headaches and migraines.
As per the results a survey, out of 380 patients with daith piercing, approximately half of the respondents experienced improvement in the severity of their condition. If you are sick and tired, and have tried everything that is out there to treat your throbbing migraine; and if you are not the biggest fan of multiple ear piercings or where you want them, you can replace the daith by opting for actual acupuncture. The spot is targeted by acupuncturists to help bring relief from migraines. The specialist would focus on the pressure point or spot during the session. This technique of ear acupuncture can assist relief following the treatment.
Risks involved
With any treatment for migraines relating to piercings or ear acupuncture, it is always a smart decision to scale the risks involved. Daith piercing may carry few risks that you should be way about:
- Bacterial infections during healing
- Bleeding
- Allergic reaction
- Swelling
- Nerve damage
Before considering daith piercing as an alternative, speak to your doctor or a qualified practitioner. They help you decide whether this method is suitable for you or not. Furthermore, though genetically linked, it is believed that migraines don’t really get triggered by the similar genes, it takes rounds of trial and error to find the appropriate treatment for every patient.
Ear piercing or daith piercing do have shown evidence for migraine relief, and if you think a not-so-traditional ear ring can, to an extent, reduce your raging migraine pain, or might even keep them from happening at all? Then you do you. Just keep in mind that with every other ailment and its treatment, including migraines, what works for one might not work the same for the other.
