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At only 10 years old, Jimmy was suffering from frequent and severe migraines, some lasting as long as six weeks. He slowly gave up most physical activity in favor of lying down, hoping to stave off the waves of nausea and pain that swept over him.
“It was horrible – as a parent, you feel like you let your child down and can’t help him,” said Jimmy’s mother, Sandra Miele. “I didn’t know what to do for him – we had taken him to every doctor you could imagine and no one knew what it was."
Just when Sandra was running out of options for tests and doctors, Jimmy’s pediatrician recommended her to Dr. James Charles, a headache specialist and neurologist at Holy Name Medical Center. “Dr. Charles looked at me and said he was going to make my headaches go away,” said Jimmy. “He talked to me, not my mom. And he was right, they did go away!”
During a two-hour consultation, Charles posed questions no other physician had asked. He explained that migraines manifest as stomach pains in young children and sent Jimmy for an infusion treatment at Holy Name. The infusion was a combination of medications given to interrupt the pain pathway which causes migraines.
“I had never been to Holy Name, but the people couldn’t have been greater,” said Sandra. “We got there at about 5:00 p.m. on Friday night and they got us all dinner because they knew we’d be there a while. They were so professional, amazing really."
Jimmy was given medication which made him sleepy and “a little out of it,” said Sandra, and went to bed that night. After waking up the next day feeling only slightly better, by lunchtime, his headache had vanished.
“When I had a migraine, it hurt so much,” said Jimmy. “But when it went away, I could do all the things I used to do and eat all the foods that used to make me sick. I want to tell people my story so no one else has to have migraines, and they know Dr. Charles can make you better.”
For more information on Dr. James Charles click here.
