Cephalalgia : an international journal of headache
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We set out to study the role of psychiatric comorbidity in the evolution of migraine to medication overuse headache (MOH) by a comparative study of 41 migraineurs (MIG) and 41 patients suffering from MOH deriving from migraine. There was an excess risk of suffering from mood disorders [odds ratio (OR) = 4.5, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.5, 13.5], anxiety (OR = 5, 95% CI 1.2, 10.7) and disorders associated with the use of psychoactive substances other than analgesics (OR = 7.6, 95% CI 2.2, 26.0) in MOH compared with MIG. Retrospective study of the order of occurrence of disorders showed that in the MOH group, psychiatric disorders occurred significantly more often before the transformation from migraine into MOH than after. ⋯ MOH patients have a greater risk of suffering from anxiety and depression, and these disorders may be a risk factor for the evolution of migraine into MOH. Moreover, MOH patients have a greater risk of suffering from substance-related disorders than MIG sufferers. This could be due to the fact that MOH is part of the spectrum of addictive disorders.
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The use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in migraine is a growing phenomenon about which little is known. This study was undertaken to evaluate the rates, pattern and presence of predictors of CAM use in a clinical population of patients with different migraine subtypes. Four hundred and eighty-one migraineurs attending a headache clinic were asked to undergo a physician-administered structured interview designed to gather information on CAM use. ⋯ The greatest users of CAM treatments were: patients with a diagnosis of transformed migraine; those who had consulted a high number of specialists and reported a higher lifetime number of conventional medical visits; those with a comorbid psychiatric disorder; those with a high income; and those whose headache had been either misdiagnosed or not diagnosed at all. Our findings suggest that headache clinic migraine patients, in their need of and quest for care, seek and explore both conventional and CAM approaches. Physicians should be made aware of this patient-driven change in the medical climate in order to prevent misuse of healthcare resources and to be better equipped to meet patients' needs.
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Contact point headaches have been attributed to intranasal contact between opposing mucosal surfaces, resulting in referred pain in the distribution of the trigeminal nerve. In subjects with primary headaches, contact points may be associated with treatment refractoriness. We aimed to assess the benefits of surgical correction in patients with refractory migraine or transformed migraine, and radiographic evidence of contact points in the sinonasal area. ⋯ Two patients (9.5%) had increase in their headache score by less than 25%. For selected patients with refractory headaches, demonstrable contact points, and positive response after topical anaesthesia, surgical approach toward the triggering factor may be useful. Prospective studies are necessary to confirm our results.
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FRAMIG 2000 is a population-based survey of medical and therapeutic management of migraine in France. A total of 312 migraine sufferers were first identified from a representative sample of 4689 adult subjects using a validated questionnaire based on the IHS migraine diagnostic criteria and administered by telephone. Subjects were then interviewed using a branching questionnaire and a computer-assisted interview technique. ⋯ Migraine sufferers declared to effectively control only four attacks out of 10 after the first intake of the usual treatment. Only 6% of subjects in the survey received a prophylactic treatment for migraine whereas 22% were in MIDAS grade III or IV. These data show that the burden of migraine does not result from a deficit in diagnosis but instead from a deficit in patient information on the proper use of current effective treatments of migraine.
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Clinical Trial
Recognition and management of migraine in primary care: influence of functional impact measured by the headache impact test (HIT).
The objective of the present study was to investigate the influence of headache-related disability on the recognition and management of migraine by French general practitioners (GPs). Forty-nine teaching GPs at the Faculty of Medicine in the Nice-Sophia-Antipolis University were involved in this study. On one day, each patient who presented during the surgery hours of these GPs was invited to complete a questionnaire aimed at identifying if he/she was a headache sufferer and, if so, whether the headache corresponded to migraine and had an impact on his/her functional ability. ⋯ Among the 176 migraine sufferers, 105 (59.7%) were not recognized as having migraine, 21 (11.9%) were recognized as having migraine but without migraine management and 50 (28.4%) were recognized as having migraine with migraine management. Recognition of migraine by GPs was statistically associated with the HIT score (OR=1.105, 95% CI: 1.056-1.157, P<0.001) and with the 1.1 and 1.2.1 IHS diagnostic categories (OR=2.942, 95% CI: 1.286-5.025, P=0.0107) whereas management of patients recognized as having migraine was only associated with the patient's age (OR=1.051, 95% CI: 1.000-1.104, P=0.0486). These results indicate that the continuing medical education of GPs should focus on the diagnosis of migraine and its impact on the lifestyle of the patient.