Headaches are the most common and familiar experience among individuals from all corners of the world, despite age, gender, or genetic background. The estimated global prevalence of about 1.1 billion sufferers, headaches and migraines are the most common neurological disease, which affects many aspects of individuals’ lives, along with placing a heavy economic burden on society. In the United States alone, as of 2020 the economic load of migraines has been estimated at $11 billion in direct cost, and about just as much in indirect cost.

Despite the current state of scientific research and its findings on headaches, especially migraines, and despite the widespread availability of drugs, their treatment still largely remains minimally successful. The current global market of migraine medication, excluding conventional over-the-counter headache drugs, is valued close to $2billion, with a yearly growth rate of over 3% since 2017. 

Headaches and migraines have many different environmental causes, with everything from food triggers, to changes in hormones, stress, and hypertension being among the most prevalent. Even though they are termed differently, a migraine is just a specific type of headache that is elevated in intensity and is frequently accompanied by other symptoms such as nausea, photophobia or phonophobia (hypersensitivity to light or sound), and in some cases even vomiting. The biological mechanisms of headaches, irrespective of the cause, are experienced through the pain sensitive nerve endings of the trigeminal nerve, which is triggered by one or more of the aforementioned environmental cues. A migraine is categorized as a neurovascular disorder, which has documented associations to cardiovascular disease.