Migraines Treatment.

When you need to relieve migraine pain and avoid new migraine attacks you need appropriate treatment for migraine headaches.

There are two ways to treat migraine - abortive and preventive.

Abortive.

This type of migraine treatment should be taken to stop migraine attack once it's started or to prevent it. The medicine stops migraine during its prodrome stage or when it has begun, you may take it as needed. Some of them can be taken as a wafer and it will melt on the tongue, others can be self-injected into the thigh. These types of migraine treatment work quickly and helpful for people who vomit when migraine starts.

Abortive drugs include the triptans, which specifically target serotonin. They have similar chemical structure and work same way. The triptans do not relieve pain from arthritis, back problems or  menstruation. They are used to treat headache pain.

Here is the list of abortive drugs:

Sumatriptan (Imitrex)
Rizatriptan (Maxalt)
Eletriptan (Relpax)
Zolmitriptan (Zomig)
Naratriptan (Amerge, Naramig)
Frovatriptan (Frova)
Almotrip

The following drugs are also affect serotonin, but they affect other brain chemicals. Also, one of these drugs works when a triptan does not.

Ergotamine tartrate (Cafergot)
Dihydroergotamine (D.H.E. 45 Injection, Migranal Nasal Spray)
Acetaminophen-isometheptene-dichloralphenazone (Midrin)

The following medicine usually used for nausea, but also have abortive or preventive effect on headaches:

Promethazine (Phenergan)
Prochlorperazine (Compazine)

The next drugs are referred to weak narcotic class. Since they can relieve any pain they are used not only for migraine treatment. Because they can form habit, they are less desirable than the specific headache drugs. These medications should be used primarily as additional treatment for the cases when a specific drug does not work.

Acetaminophen and codeine (Tylenol With Codeine)
Butalbital compound (Fioricet, Fiorinal)


Preventive

This type of migraine treatment is used when you have more than one migraine per week. They help to decrease severity and frequency of the migraine attacks. Medication to prevent a migraine can be taken daily. Preventive treatment medications include the following:

Antiseizure medications - Gabapentin (Neurontin), valproic acid (Depakote), topiramate (Topamax)

Medications used to treat high blood pressure - Beta-blockers (propranolol [Inderal]), calcium channel blockers (verapamil [Covera])

Antidepressants - Amitriptyline (Elavil), nortriptyline (Pamelor)

Some antihistamines and anti-allergy drugs, including diphenhydramine (Benadryl) and cyproheptadine (Periactin)