The Metamorphosis of Migraine: Outcomes and Outlooks

This is part 3 of a special 3-part multimedia series. For part 1, click here. For part 2, click here.

As every migraine and headache specialist is aware, the difference between the current treatment of patients with migraine and the approaches of the past are night and day. A flurry of pharmacologic and device approvals has ushered in a new age of opportunity, and secondarily, that variety of options has allowed for more patients to be managed than ever. As well, the research efforts undertaken in the last 2 decades to better understand the disease has provided even further insight into the migraine patient population.

This rapid rate of revolution in the field has set the sights of many physicians to the horizon. The bright future of the early aughts has become the positive landscape of today, and with a number of new potential targets for treatment and investigational agents showing promise, the current future has not dulled. For specialists like Jessica Ailani, MD, director, MedStar Georgetown Headache Center, and associate professor of neurology at MedStar Georgetown University Hospital, this is among the most exciting times to treat patients. No longer do physicians need to watch migraine debilitate the majority of their patients. Although, not every patient has been helped by the current therapies, and challenges do remain in addressing other headache disorders.

In this special video interview, NeurologyLive connected with Ailani to explore some of those challenges and detail the current clinical experience in the management of these patients. Ailani also spoke to the impact that the new approvals of the last decade have had on patient care, and how they’ve revealed the role that patient and provider education and awareness can have in the improvement of that landscape. She also discussed the coming years, from the targets being explored to the devices being developed, and her hopes for the eventual fruition of precision medicine in migraine.