About 283 million people worldwide suffer from alcohol use disorder, a health issue that can be really tough to deal with.
One big reason is that when they stop, they get terrible headaches, and they know that drinking can make the headache go away.
So, they go back to alcohol, and it becomes a cycle. This is how they become dependent on alcohol.
A study that can fix it
A researcher named Yu Shin Kim and their team found that a stress hormone called corticotropin-releasing factor (CRF) does something important.
It activates some immune cells called mast cells in a thin layer under your skull called the dura.
This layer has nerve fibers and blood vessels. CRF talks to a specific mast cell receptor called MrgprB2.
After you stop drinking alcohol, your brain releases the CRF stress hormone. It travels through your blood vessels to the dura and talks to MrgprB2.
This makes the mast cells release chemical messengers, which do things like making blood vessels wider.
It also makes your sensory nerves more sensitive, and that's why you get headaches when you're withdrawing from alcohol.
Why it's important
This research can help us understand more about why people get headaches when they stop drinking.
It might even lead to new medicines that can help reduce these headaches during alcohol withdrawal.
