Geneticist Emily Bates of Brigham Young University was on a team studying the link between sleep patterns and migraine.

Geneticist Emily Bates of Brigham Young University was on a team studying the link between sleep patterns and migraine.

Bates experienced migraines as a child. She made this painting to depict how they felt to her.

Bates experienced migraines as a child. She made this painting to depict how they felt to her.

Mutations on a single gene appear to increase the risk for both an unusual sleep disorder and migraines, a team reports in Science Translational Medicine.

The finding could help explain the links between sleep problems and migraines. It also should make it easier to find new drugs to treat migraines, researchers say.

And for one member of the research team, Emily Bates, the discovery represents a personal victory.

Bates remembers getting a lot of migraines in elementary school. They would start with nausea and changes in vision, she says. Then came the pain.

"Loud sounds and light kind of hurt my eyes and my ears and my head," she says. Moving or applying any sort of pressure to her skin also hurt.

The problem was embarrassing and caused her to miss a lot of school, Bates says. It also was frustrating, she says, because back then, in the 1990s, no one could tell her much about what was causing her migraines or how to stop them.

Follow this link:
A Sleep Gene Has A Surprising Role In Migraines

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