UMSOD Finds Mindfulness an Effective Treatment for Migraines

BALTIMORE — In an article published March 13, 2020 in the journal Pain, David A. Seminowicz, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Neural and Pain Sciences at the University of Maryland School of Dentistry (UMSOD), and coauthors show how mindfulness can help in the fight against migraines.

The article states that mindfulness “is an effective treatment option for episodic migraine.” In an article published March 13, 2020 in the journal Pain, David A. Seminowicz, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Neural and Pain Sciences at the University of Maryland School of Dentistry (UMSOD), and coauthors show how mindfulness can help in the fight against migraines.

It’s part of a study conducted in collaboration with Jennifer A. Haythornthwaite, PhD, professor in the John Hopkins School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and a coauthor of the Pain article. Funded by a $3.6 million National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) grant, subjects received weeks of training at Johns Hopkins in either enhanced mindfulness-based stress reduction or a tailored course on stress management for headaches. Patients recorded their headaches in a diary and received functional MRI testing at UMSOD at baseline and at 10 and 20 weeks.

The results were positive: Mindfulness was an effective treatment for those suffering from migraines. The researchers found that, compared to those who received training in stress management, those who practiced enhanced mindfulness had fewer headache days and reduced headache-related disability. The MRI findings suggested that the enhanced mindfulness group also had improvements in attention-related brain network function.

In the Pain article, Seminowicz and his coauthors write that the results were “comparable to commonly used first[-]line treatments” such as valproic acid.

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