Migraine and Headache: causes in Chinese medicine

Migraine  and Headache problems affect eight million people in the UK alone. That’s 12% of us. It’s a worldwide problem, more common than asthma, diabetes and epilepsy combined. What does Chinese medicine have to say about it?

Towards the bottom of this page we’ve described some kinds of head pain and suggested possible syndromes for them.

However, just before that – near the bottom of the page – is a copy of a letter to the editor of the Journal of American Medical Association. This respected journal carried an article on the prevention of migraine which mentioned a number of treatments for which there is no evidence and failed to mention acupuncture, for which there is abundant positive evidence!

A Kind of Headache

Although they can be very severe, incapacitating people for days on end, migraines are still just one form of headache, and headaches have many causes in Chinese medicine.

There are some forms of severe headache for which you should get urgent medical attention, whether or not you also decide to consult Chinese medicine. Click here.

The Head

Your head is where, in Chinese medicine, your Yang energies concentrate and collect. All your Yang acupuncture channels meet here, and if clear Yang energy ascends properly, you will have good hearing, good vision, a good sense of smell and good taste-buds. You will also be able to think clearly.

Too much Yang, however, can makes your head feel like bursting!

Conversely, when Yin forms of energy, such as phlegm, catarrh, mucus and coldness, get stuck in the head, you feel confused, heavy-headed and slow.

However, your head itself and its contents (eg your brain) are said to be ‘ruled’ by your Kidneys (capital ‘K’ denotes the Kidney Zangfu or energy organ). Kidney deficiency causes many long-term deep-seated problems.

What about the Chinese idea of ‘Blood’ for Migraine and Headache?

Also, your Blood (capital B) must flow smoothly through your head. As with orthodox medicine, Blood is a big subject in Chinese medicine. That link to Blood tells you more about the ideas behind it.

Too much or Too Little

From the above alone, you will understand that in Chinese medicine migraine and headache problems arise from :

• An excess of Yang which could also be from Yin deficiency
• Too little Yang (Yang deficiency)
• Too much Yin such as too much cold, damp or phlegm

• Kidney malfunction (Kidney with Capital K)
• Blood not flowing properly (Blood with capital B)

Internal and External Causes

Internal means the problem arose from something already there, although it may have in turn been prompted by something from outside.

External means, in Chinese medicine, the environment and weather are seen as the cause – although there would have had to be susceptibility to it before External factors take hold.

Internal Reasons for Migraine and Headache

Too much yang

Too much Yang pushing up and collecting in your head can come from various internal problems:

• Wind – especially Liver Wind. This is like an internal tempest that sweeps upwards inside you. Wind-caused problems can happen very fast. They arise because your Liver energy isn’t secure or stable. They are so bad that in some people they cause symptoms that Western medicine describes as ‘stroke’.
• Liver Fire. This is heating and drying. It inflames tissues, causing red eyes and rashes, tinnitus and often affects people who easily become irascible. It strongly affects the temples and there may be dizziness. This causes severe forms of migraine and headache: more likely headache than migraine, however.
• Liver Yang rising. Mostly this has pain at the temples, also affects the vision and the ears, and is often caused by stress or internal emotional tensions (these often produce Liver Qi stagnation, listed next). Often there is a deficiency of Kidney Qi too. Very common in migraine and headache.
• Liver Qi stagnation. This affects every man, woman and child in the world from time to time. It’s such a big subject that I’ve written a book about it. What often helps this condition, at least in the short term, is exercise.
• Stomach Heat and Stomach Damp-Heat. This doesn’t usually directly affect your head, but it produces pain in your face, often from mucus in the sinus cavities or in your nose. It can sometime accompany other forms of migraine and headache. What you eat and how you eat it strongly affect whether you get Stomach Heat, so this syndrome (together with several kinds of Blood deficiency) brings in the food sensitivity issue.

Too much Yin in the head?

• Cold, stuck in the Liver channel: this produces a kind of solid, clamped, sensation in the head, but its main symptoms are usually felt in the abdomen with feelings of constriction, and a sensation of coldness not merely there but also in the hands and feet. Often you feel better for warmth. Sometimes you feel nauseous but if anything comes up, it’s clear liquid. Uncommon in  migraine, but not uncommon in headache.
• Damp. This can be a real problem, causing heaviness and slowness but not so much migraines, on its own.
• Phlegm. This causes dizziness, and often there is real actual phlegm in the sinuses or nose or throat, or even heard as crackling in the ears. There are various kinds of phlegm, eg phlegm affecting the Heart. When you get Wind-Phlegm,  dizziness can be severe and sudden.
• Blood Stasis or ‘Stagnation’. Blood ‘stuck’ or stagnating in the head is common in various forms of severe headache, and can occur in migraine.

Deficiency conditions causing migraine and headache

• Qi deficiency. This kind of headache is usually mild and much better for rest. It’s the kind of headache when you like rubbing your head, or closing your eyes, or stopping work. Much better after a good sleep, or even a doze.
• Blood deficiency. There are various kinds of Blood deficiency, for example see Liver Blood deficiency. This type can certainly appear with migraine.
• Kidney deficiency. This goes beyond mere Qi deficiency, and usually arises after a longish period of overdoing it – by which I mean over-working or trying to do too much for your constitution. It also gradually starts happening as you grow older. Commonly there is backache, tinnitus and knee pain as part of the ongoing picture. The pain in the head is usually at the base of the skull, which is not where most people get migraine or headache pains first. However, it can occur in people who also have Liver Yang rising.

External Conditions

So-called external conditions causing migraine and headache arise from the weather, the climate and sudden changes in temperature or conditions that we cannot adjust to fast enough.

These include, for some people, air-conditioning and central heating, (together with the dust and other allergens they may carry) when the body is hit by a sudden change in ambient temperature. 

Usually there is a ‘wind’ as well. This ‘wind’ could come about from driving with the window open in summer, enjoying the breeze into the car as you speed along. For some people, this is enough to set off a headache.

Incidentally, it may go further than mere migraine or headache! I have seen many patients who got facial paralysis (Bell’s Palsy) from exposure to the weather or the wind.

• Wind, hot and cold: read more by clicking on the link.
• Damp and Wind. Much sneezing and shivering with signs of weakness, heaviness and swelling in the face. Not so likely to cause migraine, but damp itself can so load your system that it becomes prone to various forms of migraine and headache.