Effectiveness of eye movement exercise and diaphragmatic breathing with jogging in reducing migraine symptoms: A preliminary, randomized comparison trial

Abstract

Background: Migraine is a multifactorial headache disorder. Maladaptive functional networks or altered circuit-related connectivity in the brain with migraine appear to perturb the effects of usual treatments. Objectives: In the present preliminary trial, we aim to study the effectiveness of performing pieces of body–mind, cognitive, or network reconstruction-based training (i.e., eye movement exercise plus jogging; EME+J and diaphragmatic breathing plus jogging; DB+J) in decreasing migraine symptoms. Methods: We used a three-arm, triple-blind, non-inferiority randomized comparison design with pre-test, post-test, and follow-up measurements to assess the effectiveness of EME+J and DB+J in the brain with migraine. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the study groups to perform either 12 consecutive weeks of EME+J (n = 22), DB+J (n = 19), or receiving, treatment as usual, TAU (n = 22). Results: The primary outcome statistical analysis through a linear mixed model showed a significant decrease in the frequency (p =.0001), duration (p =.003), and intensity (p =.007) of migraine attacks among the interventions and measurement times. The pairwise comparisons of simple effects showed that EME+J and DB+J effectively reduced migraine symptoms at the post-test and follow-up (p