sincerely hoping this is the worst thing that gets said in this year's Migraine World Summit

[kaberett]

In response to a question about non-diet lifestyle factors for managing migraine, from someone who has multiple publications in Nature-subsidiary journals pushing the idea of migraine as at least in part a metabolic disorder, following a lengthy Bit about how Blue Light Glasses are An Absolute Must to Reduce Oxidative Stress In The Eye:

Then we have toxins. Toxins in cleaning products, toxins in makeup -- for women -- toxins in perfume. Perfumes are unregulated; they have all sorts of crappy stuff in there, and these odorants go directly into the brain via the nose because the blood-brain barrier is broken in the nose; otherwise, we couldn't smell. So chemicals can go directly in there, which I believe is also why perfumes are such a potent migraine trigger -- and cigarette smoke.

Like. On the one hand they left it in, which means I am using it as a barometer for how much to trust anything else this person says, but. but. THE BLOOD-BRAIN BARRIER IS BROKEN IN THE NOSE.

Comments

[conuly]

That'd be a pretty hefty design flaw. Admittedly, the human body has a lot of those, but still.

[phi]

...

......

Wow

[sfred]

:-O

[lilysea]

What the fuck?

I wonder if they heard about people getting amoeba in the brain after jumping feet first into contaminated water and getting contaminated water forced up their nose (a thing that does happen, fortunately rare, but often fatal)

and reached some Very Wrong Conclusions From This

[recessional]

Yeah like: it’s one of the MOST VULNERABLE parts if the body in that sense!

…but. Uh.

[fyreharper]

SCIENCE!! :facepalm:

[silveradept]

That is certainly a statement to make aloud and believe you will not be snarked nor laughed out of the room.

[ewt]

Also, and I realise this is a more run-of-the-mill objection: women are not the only people who use makeup.

[kaberett]

YUP

[rydra_wong]

Though you could also interpret that sentence as saying that only makeup for women contains toxins; men and non-binary people get the special non-toxic makeup.

[recessional]

Also perfumes are so not unregulated. XD

[chiasmata]

BROKEN!

[vass]

But do the blue light blocking glasses stop chemicals from going in there?

[403]

...This might be my first ever experience of fremdschäm. Ow.

[azurelunatic]

WHAT

[hairyears]

Ummm... Yeah, it is this broken. The olfactory sensors are central nervous system cells - not peripheral nerves - and they connect directly into the olfactory bulb.

This is the route by which herpes sores on the face become Herpes simplex encephalitis, a fatal brain infection.

Oddly enough, those olfactory cells were the first CNS cells observed to regrow after damage or cell death: you can recover your sense of smell if they're killed by an infection or a whiff of ammonia.

[fyreharper]

Ooookay, that’s my dose of body horror for the day……

[kaberett]

[placeholder: thank you for this correction! I am trying to scrape together concentration to do some more reading on whether perfume molecules ACTUALLY MAKE IT TO THE BRAIN, at which point I will post a top-level correction]