Print
Jun 13, 2006 7:05 pm US/Eastern
Migraines And Sexual Desire May Be Linked?
New Study Links The Two Through A Brain Chemical
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
Andrew Llerena gets frequent migraine headaches, but he said that pain never interferes with his romantic desire.
"When you're in the mood, you're in the mood. It doesn't matter if you got a headache or not," he said.
Now a new study on migraines and sexual desire suggests he's not exaggerating.
Researchers out of Wake Forest University School of Medicine discovered people who get frequent migraines tend to have a greater sexual appetite.
The reason may be a brain chemical that both influences sexual desire and migraine headaches.
Roosevelt Hospital's Dr. Lawrence Newman is a headache specialist. He said this study involved only a handful of young people, and can't yet be applied to the general public.
"There's definitely a relationship between serotonin and sex drive but how it's related is still up in the air," he said. "They didn't control, did these patients also have depression, maybe that's why some people had lower sexual desires than others, were they on other medications? We just don't have enough information."
But, Dr. Newman said this new research could help doctors develop future medications for migraine headache suffers.
(© MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
