Dietary Considerations in Migraine Management: Does a Consistent Diet Improve Migraine?

Abstract

The clinical expression of migraine is significantly impacted by dietary and gastrointestinal issues. This includes gut dysfunction during and between attacks, food triggers, increase in migraine with obesity, comorbid GI and systemic inflammation influenced by diet, and specific food allergies such as dairy and gluten. Practitioners often encourage migraineurs to seek consistency in their lifestyle behaviors, and environmental exposures, as a way of avoiding sudden changes that may precipitate attacks. However, rigorous evidence linking consistency of diet with improvement in migraine is very limited and is, at best, indirect, being based mainly on the consistency of avoiding suspected food triggers. A review of current data surrounding the issue of dietary consistency is presented from the perspective of migraine as an illness (vulnerable state), as a disease (symptom expression traits), and with a view toward the role of local and systemic inflammation in its genesis. Firm recommendations await further investigation.

What the Gut Can Teach Us About Migraine

“…Inflammation at the level of the trigeminovascular system is hypothesized to play a role in migraine pathophysiology and could be influenced by inflammation and immune modulation in the GI tract and systemically as evidenced by recent studies [90,91]. Likewise, there is evidence to suggest that the gut microbiota plays an important role in the brain-gut axis and aberrancies may be associated with neurological disease like migraine.…”

Dietary Intake Patterns and Diet Quality in a Nationally Representative Sample of Women With and Without Severe Headache or Migraine

“…Commonly cited dietary triggers include chocolate, cheese, processed meats, and red wine; however, to date, there are no studies which unequivocally support the role of specific foods in migraine. Yet, elimination diets are often clinically recommended to mitigate migraine attacks . Other investigations suggest that eating frequency, meal timing, and the macronutrient composition of the diet may also play a role in migraine .…”

Comparison of Diet Quality Between Women With Chronic and Episodic Migraine

“…Many studies evaluated the effect of single or multiple dietary factors on migraine . Moreover, there is some evidence to indicate the positive effect of high diet quality on migraine management . So, this study compared the diet quality of women with CM and EM.…”

“…Evans and colleagues have revealed significant differences between the diet quality of women with and without migraine and suggested that improving diet quality may be effective as part of the migraine treatment process . In addition, some evidence indicates that a higher consumption of healthy food items including fruits, vegetables, and whole grains and a lower consumption of fats might be effective in reducing migraine severity and attack frequency …”