You might suffer from migraines or someone you know may suffer from migraine headaches. Alternatively, you might have recently had a member of your family diagnosed as having migraines or you might be a student researching a paper about this particular form of headache. Regardless of why you are researching the subject of migraine headaches you will find that there is a lot of information to be had on the subject.

Migraine is a medical disorder called a neurological syndrome and its main characteristics in the majority of individuals are normally very painful headaches accompanied by nausea. It is also interesting to note that this fairly common condition affects women more than it does men.

The pain from the migraine is often found on one side of the head and can on the whole described as throbbing or pulsating in nature. Migraines will ordinarily last anywhere from 4 to 72 hours and may be anywhere from moderate to severe in intensity. You might well run into other additional symptoms like vomiting or sensitivity to light or sound.

Another interesting feature of some migraines is the presence of an "aura" in at least one-third of individuals who suffer from migraine. An aura occurs before the arrival of the migraine and might include such things as the appearance of bright lights, zigzag lines or distorted shapes in a variety of sizes and colors which block the line of vision. Your field of vision might also decrease and can appear like tunnel vision or perhaps a curtain-like effect often over one eye or dark spots which spread slowly.

You may also experience auditory changes like hearing voices or sounds in the environment like buzzing. You could experience peculiar smells or perhaps sensations of numbness or tingling on one side of the face or arms and legs. You could get a feeling of being separated from your body or a sense like your arms and legs are moving independently from the body. You could feel fear or anxiety alongside the aura or a weakness or unsteadiness. Occasionally individuals who experience an aura are not able to understand words which are being spoken to them and can become very tired and feel a particular warmth throughout their body.

Aside from migraine headaches which are accompanied by an aura there are other ways of describing migraines.

For instance, familial hemiplegic migraines (FHM) are those that are the result of ion channel mutations. Those people suffering from this type of migraine usually experience limb weakness on one side of their body with vision or speech difficulties.

Another type of migraine is the abdominal migraine where children get many of the symptoms of a migraine headache with the exception of the head pain. Symptoms like nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain may last anywhere from 1 to 72 hours.

Lastly, menstrual and acephalgic migraines are two other reasonably common types of migraine. An acephalgic migraine is one in which an individual generally experiences an aura but does not experience a headache. Menstrual migraines are either menstrual related migraines (MRM) or pure menstrual migraines (PMM). The menstrual related migraine is moderate to severe in pain intensity and occurs about the time of the monthly period and at other times as well. Pure menstrual migraines are experienced only at about the time of the woman's monthly period.