Discussing real-world cases, this practical guide highlights areas of diagnostic uncertainty and shows common pitfalls in headache diagnosis and treatment.

Although headache is one of the most common complaints that patients bring to their clinicians, few physicians feel confident about its clinical evaluation and management. Is it a problem in its own right, or the presenting symptom of a serious medical condition? Loder, Rizzoli and Burch bring a practical case-based approach to this complex ailment, highlighting specific areas of diagnostic uncertainty in headache evaluation and treatment. Each case is taken from real-world clinical practice and reviews the diagnostic and treatment process in a systematic manner, identifying common challenges and pitfalls and describing newly issued treatment guidelines. Written in a question and answer format, this concise and useful guide in the Common Pitfalls series provides a step-by-step guide for everyday clinical practice, invaluable to anyone dealing with headache on a front-line basis.

There are two crucial issues in the treatment and management of headache patients: More than 50% of individuals experiencing headache have only been treated symptomatically, with no appropriate diagnosis established; and history and neurologic examination are essential to establishing a diagnosis, and thus selecting appropriate therapy. Headache and Migraine Biology and Management is a practical text that addresses these issues, featuring contributions from expert clinical authors. The book covers in detail topics including chronic and episodic migraine, post-traumatic headache, sinus headache, cluster headache, tension headache, and others. Chapters are also dedicated to treatment subjects, including psychiatric and psychological approaches, medication overuse, inpatient treatment, and pediatric issues. This book is an ideal resource for researchers and clinicians, uniting practical discussion of headache biology, current ideas on etiology, future research, and genetic significance and breakthroughs. This resource is useful to those who want to understand headache biology, treat and manage symptoms, and for those performing research in the headache field. - A practical discussion of headache biology, current ideas on etiology, future research, and genetic significance and breakthroughs - Features chapters from leading physicians and researchers in headache medicine - Full-color text that includes both an overview of multiple disciplines and discusses the measures that can be used to treat headaches

The brain is the most complex organ in our body. Indeed, it is perhaps the most complex structure we have ever encountered in nature. Both structurally and functionally, there are many peculiarities that differentiate the brain from all other organs. The brain is our connection to the world around us and by governing nervous system and higher function, any disturbance induces severe neurological and psychiatric disorders that can have a devastating effect on quality of life. Our understanding of the physiology and biochemistry of the brain has improved dramatically in the last two decades. In particular, the critical role of cations, including magnesium, has become evident, even if incompletely understood at a mechanistic level. The exact role and regulation of magnesium, in particular, remains elusive, largely because intracellular levels are so difficult to routinely quantify. Nonetheless, the importance of magnesium to normal central nervous system activity is self-evident given the complicated homeostatic mechanisms that maintain the concentration of this cation within strict limits essential for normal physiology and metabolism. There is also considerable accumulating evidence to suggest alterations to some brain functions in both normal and pathological conditions may be linked to alterations in local magnesium concentration. This book, containing chapters written by some of the foremost experts in the field of magnesium research, brings together the latest in experimental and clinical magnesium research as it relates to the central nervous system. It offers a complete and updated view of magnesiums involvement in central nervous system function and in so doing, brings together two main pillars of contemporary neuroscience research, namely providing an explanation for the molecular mechanisms involved in brain function, and emphasizing the connections between the molecular changes and behavior. It is the untiring efforts of those magnesium researchers who have dedicated their lives to unraveling the mysteries of magnesiums role in biological systems that has inspired the collation of this volume of work.

Fully-updated edition of this award-winning textbook, arranged by presenting complaints with full-color images throughout. For students, residents, and emergency physicians.

Prehospital Care of Neurologic Emergencies is a reliable and definitive resource for emergency medical services personnel at multiple levels: physicians, paramedics, nurses and others who encounter these critically ill patients. This focused and succinct book addresses the management of a wide range of neurologic emergencies, including traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, strokes, and seizures. In these emergencies time is critical, and the simply presented, straightforward format of the patient care and management recommendations help readers to treat patients rapidly and confidently. Each chapter follows a standard format that includes an overview of each neurologic emergency, important background, key challenges, and areas requiring future investigation. This book is unlikely to be placed on your bookshelf; instead, you will keep it nearby for times when you face life-threatening neurologic emergencies. When seconds count, this book has the answers.

Clinical case studies have long been recognized as a useful adjunct to problem-based learning and continuing professional development. They emphasize the need for clinical reasoning, integrative thinking, problem-solving, communication, teamwork and self-directed learning – all desirable generic skills for health care professionals. This book is a teaching tool that bridges the gap between textbook information and everyday experience of clinicians 'in the trenches'. Leading practitioners bring a practical approach to these complex conditions, highlighting specific areas of diagnostic uncertainty in evaluation and treatment. Each case is taken from real-world clinical practice and reviews the diagnostic and treatment process in a systematic manner, identifying common challenges and potential pitfalls. This concise and useful guide in the Common Pitfalls series provides a step-by-step guide for everyday clinical practice, invaluable to anyone dealing with cerebrovascular disease on a front-line basis. The intended readership is trainees and non-specialist practitioners in neurology, stroke medicine, and neurosurgery.

M. WILKINSON Patients with frequent or daily headaches pose a very difficult problem for the physician who has to treat them, particularly as many patients think that there should be a medicine or medicines which give them instant relief. In the search for the compound which would meet this very natural desire, many drugs have been manufactured and the temptation for the physician is either to increase the dose of a drug which seems to be, at any rate, partially effective, or to add one or more drugs to those which the patient is already taking. Although there have been some references to the dangers of overdosage of drugs for migraine in the past, it was not until relatively recently that it was recognized that drugs given for the relief of headache, if taken injudiciously, may themselves cause headache. The first drugs to be implicated in this way were ergotamine and phenazone. In the case of ergotamine tartrate, the dangers of ergotism were well known as this was a disorder which had been known and written about for many years. In the treatment of headache, fully blown ergotism is rare and in recent years has usually been due to self-medication in doses much greater than those prescribed although there are a few recorded cases where toxic amounts have been given.

A case-based teaching tool describing real-life cases of neuro-ophthalmic disorders. Bridges the gap between textbook information and everyday clinical practice.

Fifteen specialists serve as chapter authors, covering sex hormones and genetics, as well as the social, cultural, psychiatric, and psychological factors that contribute to headache disorders. Their approach is evidence-based, but where there are gaps in research, the authors provide advice based on expert consensus and clinical experience. Each chapter opens with a case report that synthesizes the chapter's treatment recommendations, as well as key points listing the chapter's contents. The main body of the chapter features an introductory overview, a closing summary, tables, and an extensive list of suggestive reading.