Also, if your symptoms seem to be linked to an allergy or a medication you’re taking, see your doctor. No content on this site, regardless of date, should ever be used as a substitute for direct medical advice from your doctor or other qualified clinician. Changes in the brainstem can alcohol cause migraines and its interactions with the trigeminal nerve, a major pain pathway, might be involved. So might imbalances in brain chemicals — including serotonin, which helps regulate pain in your nervous system. Learn more about the short-term and long-term effects of alcohol.
Of the 58 nonconsumer patients, 16 were abstainers but the others have consumed some type of alcoholic drinks during their life without the development of headache. In this study, six subjects of the consumer group identified white wine as a trigger, while two subjects reported red wine and two both the types of wine in the nonconsumer group (Table 3). If you experience migraine headaches after drinking alcohol, it may be best to avoid alcohol. Talk with a doctor about ways to identify your migraine triggers and what to do if you develop these headaches. In still more reports, researchers have found that white wine and other alcoholic drinks can also cause migraine episodes, and perhaps even more frequently than red wine. Compounding matters, many people who report having a migraine attack after an alcoholic drink (or drinks) say an episode is not a given every time they raise a glass.
The Connection Between Your Diet and Migraines
Chemicals called congeners are also a component of alcoholic drinks. These chemicals may also trigger migraine headaches in certain people. Studies show that many people with migraine choose not to drink alcohol for fear that it may trigger a migraine attack.
- Downing more alcohol (the “hair of the dog” theory) won’t help either.
- You can try sips (or other small amounts) of different types of alcohol to see how your migraine reacts.
- At present, most studies seem to link to headaches after alcohol to congeners, a byproduct of alcohol, most commonly found in darker drinks, such as whiskey, brandy and red wine.
2021 research also linked lifestyle factors with alcohol drinking and smoking to cluster headaches and their severity. This includes being careful about the amount of alcohol you consume and paying attention to how and when your migraine symptoms flare up in relation to drinking. Sulphites have not been shown convincingly to lead to headache in individuals with sulphite sensitivity. Sulphites are considered to be the cause of red wine intolerance, particularly asthma [51]. The relation between tyramine and migraine has been studied most extensively. Half were pioneering studies performed by Hanington et al. (see [37]) which showed that oral tyramine provoked headaches in dietary migraine patients but not in nondietary migraine or controls.
Tips to change your relationship with alcohol
Males should aim to drink two or fewer drinks daily, and females should aim to drink one or fewer. Those diagnosed with a specific type of headache may be more prone to develop a specific type of headache after consuming alcohol. As a result, a female’s blood alcohol concentration tends to be higher, making it more likely for females to experience headaches and hangovers. 2020 research shows that females are more likely to experience hangovers, memory problems, and liver disease from consuming alcohol. About half of those with less common headache disorders, such as cluster headaches, paroxysmal hemicrania, hemicrania continua, and familial hemiplegic migraine, also notice that alcohol precipitates their headaches.