Ken Babal, staff nutritionist, Erewhon Natural Foods, Los Angeles on the use of nutritional therapy as an alternative treatment for headaches:
The incidence of migraines and so on has increased rather dramatically. And we might attribute this to poor nutrition, environmental factors, pollution, stress. But one of the important areas I think we need to consider is detoxification. You know, we're living virtually in a sea of chemicals these days, like we've never been exposed to before. And I think this might be the body's way of warning us that it's reached a body burden of pollutants. So detoxification, cleansing programs, might be appropriate.
Food allergy is another area. There was a classic study done in 1979 involving headaches and food allergy. And they found a direct relationship to some of the common food allergens and headaches. Specifically wheat, chocolate, eggs, oranges, yeast…I may be missing a few, but with a rotation diet or elimination from the diet they were able to make substantial improvements in the frequency and the intensity of the headaches.