Leaderboard

@jimmys - I'm still here, and I'm cluster free after using Emgality for 2 consecutive months. I went from 5 hits a day, to about 2, to none over a few weeks, then totally pain free. I did not take it the 3rd month, and am still pain free a month in. I have also tapered off all Verapamil, etc. I did not have any side effects to speak of. Get in touch with me directly with any questions and good luck!

....no mirrors in yur house bro?

jimmy', your best bet is to type Emgality into the search bar at the top right of the page. You'll see more responses that way. I think they have been mixed: little or no success for some, good results for others. Important to keep in mind that people for whom it worked probably are no longer here or might never have been here.

You really haven't said much in your posts here, at least as I remember them, about your symptoms. You mentioned that you have an atypical pattern during attacks, which I think you said come in waves. That and the Advil (and your now trying O2) is about all you have mentioned, at least as I remember. What medicines or treatments have you tried? Do you have these kinds of symptoms? Excruciating pain that is generally situated in, behind or around one eye, but may radiate to other areas of your face, head and neck One-sided pain Restlessness Excessive tearing Redness of your eye on the affected side Stuffy or runny nose on the affected side Forehead or facial sweating on the affected side Pale skin (pallor) or flushing on your face Swelling around your eye on the affected side Drooping eyelid on the affected side

Signals I pay for my 02 out of pocket, it was cheaper for me in the long run. My insurance company has a set price on how much a tank is but when I asked about paying for it on my own the price dropped about $250 bucks. I have a company that I found just outside of Philadelphia that I get tanks dropped off at my house the day after I call in my order. They started me off with 2 M60 and i think 4 E tanks, due to the lack of record keeping and the delivery driver being understanding/not caring I have a good stock pile of tanks now. Be ready for a fight, it took me more then a few months of yelling at and arguing with different 02 shops and vendors to get what I have now. As far as busing goes you can become a farmer and grow your own at home. This is not the portion of the board to talk about it but read up and sk questions and you will have a tun of help and support here.

It lowers your blood pressure. That can be too much. What is your BP currently? 240 per day lowered mine to 80/60 at times. Needless to say, I quit taking it. I could not take enough to help. When it gets too low, I get very fatigued. A cycle will make you tired as it moves along. Especially if you get nocturnal hits. They keep you up at night and then you can become prone to getting a hit if you try to nap. The D3 Regimen is awesome! It helps many patients on this board. Some go pain free and others get lower intensity hits and slower ramp up times. Both are a huge help in controlling the pain.

Kat, Gender has little to do with the efficacy of oxygen therapy in aborting CH. If used properly with hyperventilation at forced vital capacity tidle volumes either with 100% oxygen at 30 to 40 liters/minute with a non-rebreathing oxygen mask, hyperventilating with an oxygen demand valve, or by hyperventilating with room air for 30 seconds at forced vital capacity tidle volumes then inhale a lungful of 100% oxygen and hold it for 30 seconds then repeat this sequence until the pain is gone. In all three methods, the average abort time should be around 7 minutes with > 95% efficacy and it has nothing to do with gender. What most doctors and neurologists don't understand about effective oxygen therapy as a CH abortive, is oxygen is only half of the abortive. The other half involves blowing off CO2 faster than the body generates it through normal metabolism by intentionally hyperventilating for 6 to 7 minutes pushes the body into respiratory alkalosis. In simple terms blowing off CO2 by hyperventilating shifts blood pH to the alkaline side of neutral making it more alkaline, hence the term respiratory alkalosis. I need to point out that respiratory alkalosis from intentionally hyperventilating is temporary and harmless. It clears normally within a few minutes once returning to normal breathing rates. Respiratory alkalosis does several things that help abort CH. The first effect of respiratory alkalosis with an elevated arterial pH, is to slow the expression of Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide (CGRP) and Substance (SP) by neurons in the trigeminal ganglia. CGRP and SP are responsible or the neurogenic inflammation and pain we know as CH. What also happens during respiratory alkalosis is elevating arterial blood pH in the lungs to the alkaline side of neutral, increases blood hemoglobin's affinity for oxygen. This enables blood hemoglobin to carry up to 117% of oxygen where breathing a little faster than normal elevates blood oxygen to only 99%. This super-oxygenated blood flow and low arterial pH does two things. It speeds up the breakdown of CGRP and SP and It also triggers triggers pH homeostasis when chemo receptors in the brain stem and aortic arch sense the low arterial CO2 concentration. These chemoreceptors signal the breathing control neurons in the brain stem to slow the respiratory rate. They also signal the heart to beat more slowly and arteries and capillaries throughout the body including the brain and trigeminovascular complex to constrict. All this happens to slow the flow of blood to the lungs to prevent the loss of CO2 and allow its arterial concentration to rise back to normal levels. While we're intentionally hyperventilating, this triggers the vasoconstriction throughout the trigeminovascular complex and this serves as a significant CH abortive effect. I can hear the wheels turning... WTF are Forced Vital Capacity Tidal Volumes? The answer is simple once you understand the terms. Tidal Volume = The volume of air (or oxygen) inhaled and exhaled. The air comes into the lungs during inhalation and goes out when exhaling, just like the tide comes in and goes out. Vital Capacity = The maximum amount of air a person can expel from the lungs after a maximum inhalation without thinking about it. Forced Vital Capacity = By doing an abdominal crunch, tightening the abdominal and chest muscles as in doing sit-ups at the end of a forceful exhalation, squeezes out an additional half to full liter of exhaled breath highest in CO2 content. If you hold the abdominal crunch and chest squeeze for at least a second, your exhaled breath will make a wheezing sound. Try it now and hold the squeeze until your breath makes a wheezing sound. Accordingly, hyperventilating at forced vital capacity tidal volumes pumps CO2 from the blood stream much faster than "normal respiration." Now for the proof this method of oxygen therapy and breathing techniques makes oxygen therapy very effective with an average abort time of 7 minutes. We conducted a pilot study of this method of oxygen therapy (hyperventilating with 100% oxygen) with seven CHers (6 CCHers and 1 ECHer, six men and one woman) in 2008. Four of the CHers used an oxygen demand valve and the other three used a Flotec 0-60 liter/minute oxygen regulator set a a flow rate of 40 liters/minute with a Cluster O2 Kit mask from CH.com equipped with a 3-liter reservoir bag. Abort times with either method were the same. Each of the seven CHers collected abort time and CH pain level at start of therapy for every CH aborted for a period of 8 weeks. This came to a total of 366 aborts with this method of oxygen therapy. 364 of these aborts were rated as successful with a complete CH abort in 20 minutes or less for a success rate of 99.4%. The results are plotted out in the following graphic. The average abort time for these 364 aborts was 7 minutes. One of the pilot study participants collected abort time and pain level data for a week while waiting for his oxygen demand valve, using a disposable non-rebreathing (NRB) oxygen mask at an oxygen flow rate of 15 liters/minute. As you can see, the demand valve method (hyperventilating with 100% oxygen) results in CH aborts 3 to 4 times faster than using a disposable NRB oxygen mask at a flow rate of 15 liters/minute. We also discovered an interesting phenomenon that the higher the CH pain level, the longer it took to abort to abort the CH. This has never been reported in any of the previous RCTs or studies of oxygen therapy as an abortive for CH or Migraine. For reference, I hold a patent on the oxygen demand valve method of aborting CH. I've also over 15 years training in Aviation Physiology primarily involving oxygen breathing systems and their use in flight. Bottom line, hyperventilating at forced vital capacity tidal volumes with 100% oxygen or hyperventilating with room air at forced vital capacity tidal volumes then inhaling a lungful of 100% oxygen and holding it for 30 second then repeating this sequence 6 more times for an average total of 7 minutes are equally effective in aborting CH. Hope this helps. Take care, V/R, Batch