Posted by JohnB (206.165.44.106) on September 05, 1999 at 21:10:54:
Caveat: I am a chronic sufferer of many years. My thought processes are highly suspect.
I have been using cryotherapy and oxygen recently to abort KIP-5 level headaches with quite a bit of success. I have purchased a couple of "Jack Frost" cold packs from a medical supply company. These cold packs are about 5" by 10", and are filled with a gel that won't freeze solid in your freezer. They have an insulating pad on one side so holding them doesn't freeze your hand.
I put them in the freezer, where they get down to about 10 degrees. When the demon comes, I run and grab them, and start breathing oxygen. I put one pack on my temple and eye. I move the other one around my head on the same side, but from top to back and neck.
I have even gotten a crew cut to allow the cold packs to be closer to my scalp.
I can't tell time when I have a CH, but after a short while, my head gets pretty well chilled. After a while longer, I get a chill through my body. At this point, the demon takes a hike.
For example, today I had 3 ch's. The first two never got worse than KIP-5. The third one came on really fast. By the time I had settled in and had been chilling my cranium for a minute or two I had about a KIP-8. I thought I was going to have to drop everything and start "the stagger". But no, it never got worse, and about 3 minutes later it was gone.
Well, I've been around CH long enough to know that a couple of weeks experience with something that "works" means very little, if anything. Just wanted to pass this along and see if anyone else has tried this, or wants to try it.
I think the advangage to the Jack Frost cold packs is that they get really cold, and they can still form-fit to your head and really chill it down fast. Could just be a pain distraction and it could be that the cluster attack is really being aborted by the oxygen alone. I would be interested to hear other opinions.
c