Have you tried the magic mushroom headache cure?

In 2006, the medical journal Neurology published a study where more than 50 percent of the people revealed that “magic mushrooms” caused total cessation of their cluster headaches, while about a quarter said that the drug aborted a headache mid-attack.

The study has since been verified by sufferers all over the country who tell their stories on Web forums. The Atlantic reports that one contributor wrote that he has been taking a preventative dose every 60 days for more than four years now, and he’s spent “the vast majority of the last four years completely pain-free.”

The active ingredient in the mushrooms is psilocybin. People visit Web forums like ClusterBusters.org with questions about growing these mushrooms, how to properly dose themselves, and other alternative treatments outside of mainstream medicine.

Unfortunately, if you mention this to your doctor, all he or she can do is suggest you research it, and then prescribe you an ineffective pill.

That’s because these mushrooms are considered an illegal drug, so although they are healing people, they can’t be studied. Do we need more evidence of the pharmaceuticals’ complete monopoly on “health” care?

Researchers think the debilitating cluster headaches begin in the hypothalamus, and that the psilocybin slows blood flow to the area, preventing the onset of a cluster attack.