Should I Try A New Migraine Med?

With all the new migraine medications and treatments hitting the market, is it time to try something new?

As with any migraine medication, the new treatments have been very helpful for many - an not so helpful for others. One of the downsides of is that new treatments are - new! We simply don't have evidence from the long term testing that some other treatments have.

(For more specifically on CGRP drugs, see CGRP Antagonists: Not for Everyone? Experts Weigh in...

So the moral is that there may be an older treatment that will work better for you.

If you're interested in trying something new, the next question is - preventative or abortive? Something you use regularly to prevent migraine attacks, or something you take to stop a migraine attack?

You'll want to discuss the options with your doctor, but you have to consider how disabling your symptoms are, and how frequent your attacks are. Many people struggle along with abortives when they could avoid a lot of attacks with preventatives.

You'll also want to consider how often a medication needs to be taken (preventative does not always mean every day! It could be every few months even.) and how it's taken (liquid? pill? injection?).

Here is a short list of some the new and emerging treatments, 5 preventative and 5 abortive:

Preventatives

Vyepti (IV)
Emgality (injection)
Ajovy (injection)
Aimovig (injection)
GammaCore (non-drug device)

Abortives

Ubrelvy (oral)
Reyvow (oral)
Nurtec (oral)
Nerivio (non-drug device) *rebate in June*
GammaCore (non-drug device)

A MWS Gift!

I'm sending this newsletter a little earlier than normal, to make sure you know about this special gift from the Migraine World Summit. There is currently a free re-broadcast of the summit happening until the 19th! Here's what you need to know:

A Gift from the Migraine World Summit!

Say what?! Intravenous therapy (IV)

You may have noticed that one of the medications above is taken intravenously. IV therapy delivers a medication directly into a vein, and is usually done in a hospital setting. This works well for Vyepti because you only need to take it four times a year.

Read more here: Intravenous Medication Administration

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