Science Says Migraine Sufferers Could Be Less Likely To Develop This Major Disease

Like wasps, there seems to be nothing good going for migraines. When you have one, they feel needlessly painful, and they ruin your day for absolutely no good reason at all. While they ruthlessly plague a large amount of the population, your next migraine might feel a tiny bit better now that research has shown that there could be a silver lining to the condition after all. A recent study has shown that, for women, migraines may reduce your chances of getting diabetes, so, y'know, swings and roundabouts.

A group of European researchers revealed the conclusions of their study into migraines the the end of 2018, and there were some surprisingly positive insights. At the end of their studies, the researchers concluded that they "observed a lower risk of developing type two diabetes for women with active migraine and a decrease in active migraine prevalence prior to diabetes diagnosis."

According to the research paper, studies initially took place as a relationship between migraines and diabetes had been suspected, but prior to this study, no one had been able to pinpoint quite what that association was. As it turns out, one might well affect the other.

According to Paul Rizzoli, MD, who wrote about this study for Harvard Health Publishing, the link between migraines and diabetes wasn't exactly news to headache specialists. They've long observed that their patients suffering with migraines tended not to avoid developing diabetes as frequently as the "general population," but now they have the evidence to prove it. Speaking about the study, Rizzoli said:

"This was a large, well-conducted study. Two limitations were that it only studied women and that the population studied was a rather homogeneous group of mostly white professionals. Nonetheless, experts feel that the findings can likely be generalised to other populations."

To conduct their study, the researchers followed almost 75,000 women for a decade. At the end of the 10 years, it was found that, from this sample, women who suffered from active migraines were around 20 to 30 percent less likely to develop type two diabetes than those who don't. Sure, that information won't cure your aggravating headache, but it might make it slightly more tolerable in the long run.

Despite the promising findings, it's still not known why this relationship between diabetes and migraines actually exists. I mean, what exactly does a nasty headache have to do with your blood sugar and insulin levels? According to Rizzoli from Harvard Health Publishing "one consideration could be that elevated blood sugar levels are somehow protective against developing a headache." And he also states: "Yet another explanation may have to do with CGRP, a protein molecule in the body that is active in both conditions and may be the factor that links them."

Either way, I don't mind. Having discovered this research, I feel I can suffer slightly better knowing that I'm may be less likely to get diabetes simple because I am prone to getting a raging headache from time to time. As I said, swings and roundabouts.