[nabs-l] Ocular Migraines

Kaiti Shelton crazy4clarinet104 at gmail.com
Sun Oct 2 18:27:19 UTC 2016


Hi all,

Sorry for this being slightly off-topic, but I wasn't sure of any
other way to ask for information on it.

I've had some pretty bad headaches since my early teen years, but
every time I brought it up to my pediatrician (who is really good and
who otherwise I really like), she made it sound like they weren't
frequent or severe enough to cause major concern.  There was talk of
sending me to a neurologist at one point, but she never went through
with it and wanted me to rule out the possibility that the headaches
were sinus-related first, which I have done.  While I do get sinus
headaches, especially in the Spring, I can usually tell the difference
between them and my other headaches by how they feel.  Further, these
other headaches are usually there for several hours and aren't
responsive to ibuprofen or Tylenol, and typically knock me out or
leave me feeling lethargic afterwards.

Within the past year I started having instances where the vision in
the eye that has some sight would cut out for a second or two, then
come back.  This usually happened before or after a migraine headache,
but sometimes it happens for no good reason at all.  I do know that
the shunt used to keep my Glaucoma in check is starting to wear down
and will need to be replaced in the next several years, but when I
told my retina specialist about these issues he was pretty confident
that the visual disturbances I was having are caused by ocular
migraines either in my eye or near the optic nerve.  I also see a
Glaucoma specialist, and he noted around the same time I talked to my
retina doc that everything looked as stable as it can be aside from
the shunt he put in, but I read that ocular migraines are also
experienced by 2/3s of Glaucoma patients who have taken some damage to
their optic nerves as I have.

I'm wondering if anyone else has ocular migraines and might have more
information than I do.  I've been reading up on them, but obviously
I'm a bit hesitant to take everything I read on Web MD or from the
Mayo Clinic archives as something that's happening to me.  Again, I
know this isn't academic-related and am sorry for veering off-course,
but any information would be great.

Thanks,

-- 
Kaiti Shelton




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