The moment I wrote this article, it immediately received big pharma attacks. That’s great!! It seems I stirred the hornets’ nest really big!
My research based academic articles, the actual clinical trials of the drug itself, and the FDA label details, concluded that the drug doesn’t work–only a couple of migraine-free days are gained per month. There are migraineurs on Aimovig who are currently my migraine group to learn how to become migraine free.
For big pharma it is all about the money! Keep that in mind before you jump and spend a lot of money! There is a free treatment that works for all–so far getting close to 5000 migraineurs who no longer suffer migraines. It doesn’t come from medicines. It comes from understanding what migraine is.
Be aware! Help those with migraines see that this drug is not any more magic bullet than any others in the past. it may also cause permanent damage–all listed in the detailed article linked to above so please read and share!
UPDATE
So many migraine sufferers who started takign Aimovig continue to have migraines! They are continuing their other medications as well. This has to be one of the most dangerous situations for migraineurs.
Please share and let them know: this drug is not the miracle it is being sold as.
Its half-life is 28 days! That means that if one gets a horrible adverse effect, it stays for over a month! The adverse reactions are not listed on the FDA label! But they are listed on the supplementary table at the research paper’s website.
Adverse Reactions
Here they are from the research paper: cold, upper respiratory tract infection, ankle fracture, viral gastroenteritis, sepsis, colitis, vestibular neuronitis, backpain, migraine, ovarian cyst, and sinusitis. One person also experienced cerebral venous thrombosis. Over 6% of the people taking it ended up creating antibodies against it (meaning they had an immune response that can either cause an allergic reaction or lead to autoimmune diseases) and some people quit the clinical trial because of adverse effects. None of this is written on the label! Attached is an appendix of their research–see table S3 for adverse effects:
Thanks for your help in helping migraine sufferers around the world!
Comments are welcome as always and are moderated for appropriateness.
Angela
Updated: 8/12/2018 4:47 PM by Angela A Stanton, Ph.D.
About Angela A Stanton, Ph.D.
Angela A Stanton, PhD, is a Neuroeconomist focusing on chronic pain--migraine in particular--physiology, electrolyte homeostasis, nutrition, and genetics. She lives in Southern California. Her current research is focused on migraine cause, prevention, and treatment without the use of medicine. As a forever migraineur from childhood, her discovery was helped by experimenting on herself. She found the cause of migraine to be at the ionic level, associated with disruption of the electrolyte homeostasis, resulting from genetic variations of all voltage dependent channels, gates, and pumps (chanelopathy) that modulate electrolyte mineral density and voltage in the brain. In addition, insulin and glucose transporters, and several other variants, such as MTHFR variants of B vitamin methylation process and many others are different in the case of a migraineur from the general population.
Migraineurs are glucose sensitive (carbohydrate intolerant) and should avoid eating carbs as much as possible. She is working on her hypothesis that migraine is a metabolic disease.
As a result of the success of the first edition of her book and her helping over 5000 migraineurs successfully prevent their migraines world wide, all ages and both genders, and all types of migraines, she published the 2nd (extended) edition of her migraine book "Fighting The Migraine Epidemic: Complete Guide: How To Treat & Prevent Migraines Without Medications". The 2nd edition is the “holy grail” of migraine cause, development, and prevention, incorporating all there is to know. It includes a long section for medical and research professionals. The book is full of academic citations (over 800) to authenticate the statements she makes to make it easy to follow up by those interested and to spark further research interest. It is a "Complete Guide", published on September 29, 2017.
Dr. Stanton received her BSc at UCLA in Mathematics, MBA at UCR, MS in Management Science and Engineering at Stanford University, PhD in Economics with dissertation in neuroscience (culminating in Neuroeconomics) at Claremont Graduate University, fMRI certification at Harvard University Medical School at the Martinos Center for Neuroimaging for experimenting with neurotransmitters on human volunteers, certification in LCHF/ketogenic diet from NN (Nutrition Network), certification in physiology (UPEN via Coursea), Nutrition (Harvard Shool of Public Health) and functional medicine studies. Dr. Stanton is an avid sports fan, currently power weight lifting and kickboxing. For relaxation (yeah.. about a half minute each day), she paints and photographs and loves to spend time with her family of husband of 45 years, 2 sons and their wives, and 2 granddaughters.
Follow her on Twitter at: @MigraineBook, LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/angelaastantonphd/ and facebook at https://www.facebook.com/DrAngelaAStanton/
Stanton Migraine Protocol 
Hi Jessica,
It is not known if any of the adverse effects are permanent–they may be. I so far had a dozen or so migraine sufferers who quit Aimovig (and competing brands) and it seems that they have recovered but it took them as long to recover as they took the drug for, and they only recovered to that level because of the drastic diet change, which allowed their organs to heal.
The problem is that there are CGRP receptors all over the body on every organ, and they are all affected by the inhibitory function of the CGRP inhibitors and that inhibition can damage the receptors, in which case the problem may be permanent. I recommend you join my Facebook migraine group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/MigraineSufferers/ where we teach you hot to become migraine free without drugs and we also show you the best way to achieve recovery from the drugs.
Angela
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I still would like to know once the Aimovig is out if your system do side effects go away or are they permanent? Is there a chance that your body will regulate or heal itself from this drug. I’ve been taking it two years and are now experiencing horrible side effects.
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Dear Shawna,
Thank you for reading my article and for asking an extremely important question. I have joined a few Facebook groups that are specifically for Aimovig–or the other CGRP inhibitors–and have been saving the list of adverse reactions complained about by migraine sufferers in these groups. So far I have collected the following adverse reactions–which could happen from a single small dose (70):
–impossible constipation that needs prescription medicine
–major hypertension–many doctors now prescribe blood pressure medicines with Aimovig
–general inflammation–many doctors now prescribe corticosteroid for the first few days after each dose–this I return to later
–one of the most frequent complaints is loss of hair–like shower-full of hair
–major non-stop migraine
–nausea
–muscle aches all over
These are the ones that popped into my mind though there were many more.
I want to return to the corticosteroid (prednisone) prescription because that answers your question. CGRP receptors have a huge anti-inflammatory role in the body. Their are participant in the immune system in that when the immune system unleashes an attack on something, the CGRP receptors are able to “switch it off”. You can find information about that here: https://academic.oup.com/intimm/article/24/11/681/761357 It is not an easy article to read but you can take your time and look up the words you don’t know and it is a free article so you have access to it.
To be honest, if someone came to me and told me that they will pay me $10 million I would not take these drugs (any of them) and I have been a migraineur since age 10 and now am a senior.
The good thing though is that you can become completely migraine free. This is something I put my life’s work into and about 6-7 years ago I figured it all out. To date I have helped over 5000 migraineurs around the world and they are all migraine and medicine free. Please read the wall of testimonials: https://stantonmigraineprotocol.com/testimonials/ These are collected from the 2 Facebook migraine groups I am running, which you can find here and if you don;t take any preventives, then here. I also wrote a book about it. The second edition is here.
You can try and see what you think and decide how you want to manage, since becoming migraine and medicine free requires a lifestyle change. Once you achieved it though, there is nothing stopping you. Migraine-free and medicine-free life is amazing. 🙂
I hope you join us!
Angela
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Thanks so much for writing this article. This information should be available. I have deliberated about starting Aimovig for over 6 months now. Big factors for me are the cost per month, any side effects, and how much benefit can be achieved by using the medicine. I am terrified by the 28 day half-life as I am very sensitive to medication and often have intolerable side effects. More than one doctor has told me that Aimovig has no side effects because of the way it acts in the body. However, I am seeing more possible side effects listed, and I don’t think it’s possible for a medication to have no side effects. As far as a cost/benefit analysis, my doctors say that I would still have to try the medicine for 90 days before making any decision. They think I may have more than a few days benefit per month, because Aimovig did not research changes in intensity of migraines or any other factors besides number of days.
I am particularly concerned about the fact that 6% of people developed antibodies to Aimovig. I could not find the result in the link provided, but I did see a reference to the fact they did do the test. I would like more information on this. If it means that people who develop antibodies are susceptible to developing any autoimmune disease in the future, I could not take that risk! If we try Aimovig for 90 days, develop antibodies, and then discontinue Aimovig, is there still an increased risk of autoimmune issues? Or does the immune response end when the medicine is discontinued?
Thanks so much for making information available. Most of us are only told that the new CGRP medications could change our lives. Regardless of side effects, I can not spend $600/month for a few days without migraine – if that is all it provides.
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Dear Angie,
What keto diet are you on? The standard keto approach is the wrong one for migraine sufferers. I have a keto group on FB that you are more than welcome to join: https://www.facebook.com/groups/KetogenicDietforMigraines/. There are major differences in how keto should be applied to migraineurs and the ketogenic diet interacts with just about all medications (including OTC).
Another observation I have is you wrote that you used to have 5 migraines a week and now two a day. That is not possible. A migraine, by definition, lasts over 24 hours. Migraines may not be accompanied by a head pain but they generally last 48-72 hours. I suspect that you may have cluster headaches–pain behind the eye(s) often like stabbing pains. They are also called ice pick headaches and often referred to as suicide headaches. They last for a short period for each “stab” but the pains can go on for weeks. Cluster headaches often benefit from oxygen use.
There is also thunderclap headache, which involves the whole head on top of your head and all the way to the back of your neck. This kind of headache you should have a specialist examine, likely with a scan, to be sure you don;t have something nasty happening.
If your headaches start at the base of your head on the back, those are cervicogenic headaches. Cervicogenic headaches are associated with potential disc damage in the upper back and/or neck and/or are positional in origin, meaning wrong pillow type, sitting in a way that is unnatural for your neck, and most importantly very weak muscles in the cervicogenic area. So if this is the type of pain you have, starting at the back and moves toward to top and front, you would benefit from a physical therapy that would strengthen your muscles there, check your posture, your upper back and neck vertebrae and nerves there and a gym with a capable trainer that knows how to increase muscle strength in that general area.
Hope this helps,
Angela
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I have been on a low carb diet for 4 months (a keto diet) and my migraines have become progressively worse. From five migraines a week, I am now getting two a day. I want to give up the diet because it is doing me harm, but maybe you have a solution before I do so. Thanks.
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