KARACHI, Nov 13: Avoiding deep fried food, dairy products, citrus and apple juices, cocoa, coffee and excessive consumption of tea can help to avert intensity as well as frequency of migrainous pain during fast.

Prof Hasan Aziz of the Neurology Department, Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre, said though migraine itself might not be prevented, taking due care to protect oneself from precipitating factors could considerably reduce the suffering of patients.

Referring to the tendency among locals to resort to rich food, with particular reference to parathas, pakoras, samosas coupled with curd, cheese, milk juices and tea during Ramazan, the neurologist said those actually triggered migraine among the patients.

He said that dairy items, deep fried food, chocolate, coffee, apple and citrus juice acted as precipitants increasing the possibility of more frequent episodes of migraine, the commonest paroxysmal neurological disorder, though not as common as tension headaches, but still affecting 12 pe cent of the population.

Although, generally not of serious consequences, migraine is associated with a lot of morbidity, both in terms of suffering due to pain and disturbances in study and work.

Answering a question, the neurologist said that missing a meal itself was a common precipitant of the condition, as abstaining from food wholly or partly resulted in an increased turnover of brain serotonins, which might provoke an attack.

Prof Aziz, terming migraine to be an outcome of surge in generation of certain chemicals in body as well as brain, said painkillers were the simplest and most effective medical intervention against the condition.

“Oral administration of pain killer is good enough. However, if piercing headache is coupled with vomiting, then the drug may be injected”, he said.

Migraine is encountered twice more commonly among women and occurs mostly between the ages of 25 and 55 years. Migraineurs are stated to have a lowered biological threshold, making them prone to a wide variety of triggering factors which do not affect non-migrainous people.—APP