Sex may cure a migraine as well as painkillers

Pounding headache? Sex could cure what ails you just as well as medication, a new study from the University of Munster finds.

Researchers recruited 800 migraine sufferers and 200 cluster headache sufferers. While findings are preliminary, results showed that more than half of the migraine sufferers said their pain subsided after a bout of passion with their partners. Their research was reported in Cephalalgia, the journal of the International Headache Society.

The researchers suggested that sex triggers the release of endorphins, the body's natural painkillers, which can reduce, or even eliminate, a headache, The Telegraph reported. While headaches have long been used as an excuse for not having sex, the researchers reported that the male subjects in particular used sex as a "therapeutic tool."

"Our results show that sexual activity during a migraine attack might relieve or even stop an attack in some cases, and that sexual activity in the presence of headache is not an unusual behavior," the researchers wrote, according to The Telegraph.

"Sex can abort migraine and cluster headache attacks, and sexual activity is used by some patients as acute headache treatment."