The link between severe headache disorders headaches and the body's circadian clock in pain timing and thresholds will be studied with a $2.4 million grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS) to UTHealth Houston researchers. The research is led by two faculty members of McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston: Mark Burish, MD, PhD, associate professor in the Vivian L.
Smith Department of Neurosurgery, and Seung-Hee Yoo, PhD, associate professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. The study builds on earlier research by Burish and Yoo, funded by the Will Erwin Headache Research Foundation and published in 2023 in the journal Neurology , which revealed that both cluster headache and migraine are strongly linked to the internal clock that regulates body processes known as the circadian system. Burish and Yoo became interested in the topic of circadian clock regulation in headaches due to the clear circadian feature from cluster headache patients.
Cluster headache, which affects 1 in 1,000 people, is an extremely painful disorder that carries a higher risk of suicidality than the general population and can severely impact a patient's quality of life. In the previous research, Burish and Yoo found that there was a circadian pattern of cluster headache attacks in more than 70% of participants, with a peak between 9 a.m.
and 3 p.m., and seasonal peaks in spring and autumn.
"Both migraine and cluster headache, but cluster .
