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standard wherever you get your podcasts. The World Health Organization estimates that 40% of the global population suffers from some kind

of headache disorder. That's more than 3 billion people, at least occasionally laid low by

head pain that isn't associated with some other underlying

illness. About 1.2 billion of those sufferers experience migraines, and less than 1% of people

are diagnosed with a condition called cluster headache, which can come on suddenly,

deliver pain so severe that sufferers struggle to describe it and then return daily or even several

times a day for weeks or months on end.

From KERA in Dallas, this is think.

I'm Chris Boyd.

Headache disorders are a major cause of what are called disability-adjusted life years, which

is to say years in which people do not enjoy full health.

When a severe headache is happening, it is considered as disabling as dementia, quadriplegia,

even psychosis. And yet, headache research is strangely not a topic for disease researchers.

Tom Zeller Jr. has lived with cluster headaches since he was

in his 20s, and although he would welcome more scientific investment in curing what ails him,

his own research into the topic has helped him understand why headache disorders are devilishly

difficult to study. He is co-founder and editor-in-chief of Undark. That's a non-profit digital magazine exploring the intersection of science and society.

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