zonegran- has it worked for anyone?

Zonegran is the latest preventative I'm about to try (fingers crossed). I had never heard of this one before, but apparently it's similar to topomax. I've read on other sites that it's the only thing that's helped some people's migraines, though I'm trying not to get my hopes up. Has anyone tried it? What was your experience?

~ janice

I did try it. Unfortunately I ended up with severe rhinitis as a side effect which made me allergic to everything, including my husband. He was quite offended. No kidding. I had to get rid of all feather pillows and comforters. I would still wake up with massive coughing attacks all night if my husband was in the same bed. I finally got him some hypoallergenic shaving cream and deodorant, which were the only products he was using, and I could at least be around him. Any lotion or scent would start me on coughing attacks. It was a pretty bizarre couple of months. Did not help the headaches.

Turns out this is a 1 in a 100 type of side effect for the drug. I'm just one of those lucky people who seems to get the weird side effects. So unlikely it will happen to you, but you should know it is a possible so you'll recognize the signs if it does. It took me quite a while to connect the dots since the symptoms were not something I would have thought might be associated with medications.

But we are all different, so it might work for you. Good luck!

Zonegran works wonderfully for me! I went from having 3-4 migraines a week to one in the past 2 months! I don't have any side effects from it. We started me out with 50 mg am and pm and it helped a little, went ot 50 am and 100pm and that did the trick. I hope it helps you.

Oh, I tried Topomax before and had horrible side effects from it, so I was a little concerned about trying the zonegran, but my new neurologist said their are usually few side effects from zonegran. In my case she was correct.

Good luck!

Good luck with this new med. I hope it helps. Please keep us updated. If if helps you I will try it too. As we both have CDH-migraine. Do you still plan to have a second botox treatment next month....let me know. Gail

Hi Gail,

I'll keep you posted on how it goes. I'm getting a second round of botox early February. My doctor wants to try it again to see if it has more of an effect this time. Are you getting it done again? Keep me posted on how you're doing!

Even though the dr. says it will not help a second time I plan to try anyway. Did it help you in any way the first time....it did not effect me at all. That is why she feels it will not a second time. I hope your new med. does something. I am not trying anything at the current time. Nor do I have any dr. except the botox dr. Let me know how your med goes. You might be interested in a book I am presently reading. It is called Breaking the Headache Cycle. By Ian Livingstone, M.D. and Donna Novak, R. N. Talk soon: G.

how is it going with the new med......any change...

Hi Gail, Actually I think it might be doing something. It'll take more time to tell, but for 4-5 days this past week I felt really good with a lot less pain than normal which is pretty amazing for me. I also went to see a neck specialist today since an MRI shows I have a pinched nerve. I don't want to get my hopes up, but this doctor is going to inject a steroid into the C4-C5 of my neck since he says pinched nerves in this vertebrae can cause the kind of head/neck/jaw/facial pain I get. Fingers crossed that he's right that this is part of the root of my problem. I don't know what kind of pain yours is, but it was interesting that he mentioned sometimes they inject people's necks even without MRI evidence to see if it aleviates the head pain. When I've taken steroids before, my head feels great during the duration of the medicine and then my headache returns after the medicine stops. He said this makes complete sense with a herniated disc that is inflamed. I'll keep you posted! Hope you're doing alright.

Hello, I see that your trying Botox, I'm nearly into my 1st year of it and although I can't say it's been a rousing success, b/c of course I was looking for total annhilation of my migraines. My Doctor has been able to cut down on the sevarity of them, and on occasion the number of them. It did however take a few visits to feel any real results. But on the upside my skin LOOKS Really Smooth....