Migraine continues to remain a major scientific mystery. We know that it is preceded by premonitory symptoms such as aura or impaired vision in some cases, causing nausea and unilateral pain accompanied by intense headache, and involves sensory distress such as photophobia or excessive sensitivity to sound. However, the treatment of migraine remains a major clinical challenge, mainly due to the wide variety of factors that can trigger it, from family history to stress, from food to weather.

The Esteve Foundation organized Migraine headache: Current knowledge and future therapies on the 11th and 12th of June 2009 in S’Agaró (Girona), a meeting bringing together some of the most prominent researchers at the international level in the field of migraine to discuss the current knowledge and new studies on future treatments for this syndrome. Frank Porreca, from the Department of Pharmacology, University of Arizona, andDavid Dodick, from the Department of Neurology at the Mayo Clinic, were responsible for moderating this second Esteve Foundation Discussion Group.

Michael Moskowitz, Professor of Neurology at the Harvard Medical School , Peter Goadsby, of the department of Neurology at the University of California, and Michel Ferrari, of the University of Leiden, opened the meeting by describing all the factors involved in migraine. Ferrari then disucessed how genetics influences these types of headaches and Piero Geppetti, Department of Preclinical and Clinical Pharmacology, University of Florence, spoke of the effectiveness of receptor antagonists of the CGRP receptors in migraine treatment.

The next day it was the turn of Frank Porreca, who analyzed the role of triptans among other common anti-migraine drugs, and Chris Diener, Department of Neurology at the University of Essen, who gave an update on the latest studies in functional imaging in this field. Finally, Goadsby took to the floor again to speak about the most recent drug treatments to combat migraine. Julio Gomez-Pascual, of the Neurology Unit at the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital, also attended the meeting.