Migraine Auras: When the Visual World Fails

Migraine headaches are familiar and generally treatable ailments. Less understood are migraine auras or scotoma, visual distortions—sometimes accompanied by headache and sometimes not—that make it difficult, sometimes impossible, to see clearly. Migraine auras can be frightening, disorienting, even incapacitating. Richard Grossinger, who has suffered from them himself, here presents a helpful guide to the subject that maps the terrain, describes the various forms migraine auras can take, charts his personal experiences with them, and offers informed suggestions for homeopathic and other treatments.

A graduate of Amherst College, Richard Grossinger received a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Michigan, writing an ethnography of fishing in Maine. He is the author of many books, including Planet Medicine; The Night Sky; Embryogenesis: Species, Gender, and Identity; Embryos, Galaxies, and Sentient Beings: How the Universe Makes Life; Homeopathy: The Great Riddle; and On the Integration of Nature: Post-9/11 Biopolitical Notes. He and his wife Lindy Hough are the founding publishers of North Atlantic Books in Berkeley, California.