BRAINHeadaches
The joke is inevitable.
A headache has been throbbing inside your skull for hours,
resistant to everything in your medicine cabinet. Then a loved one says
in a calm, reassuring voice: "Don't worry. It's probably just a brain
tumor."
Yes, they're kidding. But what if there is something horribly wrong
inside your head? How do you tell a garden-variety headache from one that
signals an impending tumor, aneurysm, or other life-threatening
ailment?
The key warning sign is change, says Marc Simard, M.D., Ph.D., a
neuroscience professor at the University of Maryland. We all get
headaches on occasion, whether from stress, sinus pressure, or too much
beer the night before. But a sudden change in the frequency, severity, or
pattern of headaches warrants further investigation.
One cause for concern is frequent morning headaches. Tension
headaches usually occur at the end of a stressful day. But since blood
flow to our head increases when we're horizontal, headaches from
intracranial tumors that are impinging on a blood vessel are most common
when we first awake. (While sinus headaches can strike early in the day,
they're usually accompanied by sinus pressure or tenderness.)
A particularly ominous sign of trouble: suspicious headaches
accompanied by other symptoms. Weak or numb limbs, vomiting, dizziness,
and speech or vision problems suggest the tumor is interfering with brain
function, and demand immediate attention.
Because the brain itself feels no pain, a tumor generally causes
headaches only when it affects a nerve or blood vessel.
On the other hand, you're unlikely to suffer a brain aneurysm
without realizing it. The most obvious symptom is "the sudden onset of
the worst headache you've ever had," says Seymour Solomon, M.D., director
of the Montefiore Medical Center Headache Unit in New York.
The prognosis for brain cancer, while grim, is better than many may
think. The American Cancer Society estimates that of the 17,000 new brain
cancers this year, 26 percent of patients will survive at least five
years. Simard emphasizes that early diagnosis will raises the odds, "If
the tumor is found early enough, treatment can be very effective. Almost
all of the vascular lesions and many of the tumors can be treated quite
successfully and permanently."
ILLUSTRATION
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