Primary headache diagnosis among chronic daily headache patients.
Open Access
- 1 June 2003
- journal article
- Published by FapUNIFESP (SciELO) in Arquivos de Neuro-Psiquiatria
- Vol. 61 (2), 364-367
- https://doi.org/10.1590/s0004-282x2003000300008
Abstract
Chronic daily headache (CDH) refers to a group of non-paroxysmal daily or near-daily headaches with peculiar characteristics that are highly prevalent in populations of neurological clinics and not uncommon among non-patient populations. Most of the patients with CDH had, as primary diagnosis, episodic migraine, which, with the time, presented a progressive frequency, pattern modification and loss of specific migraine characteristics. Other CDH patients had chronic tension-type headache, new daily persistent headache and hemicrania continua, which evolved thru the time to the daily or near-daily presentation. The objective of this study was to determine the primary headache diagnosis among a population of chronic daily headache patients attending a tertiary center for headache treatment. During a 5-year period 651 consecutive chronic daily headache patients attending a private subspecialty center were studied prospectively. The criteria adopted were those proposed by Silberstein et al (1994, revised 1996). Five hundred seventy four patients (88.1%) had episodic migraine as primary headache before turning into daily presentation, 52 (8%) had chronic tension-type headache, 14 (2.2%) had hemicrania continua and 11 patients (1.7%) had new daily persistent headache. CDH is quite frequent in patients from clinic-based studies suggesting a high degree of disability. Emphasis on education of patients suffering from frequent primary headaches with regard to measures that are able to decrease suffering and disability as well as better medical education directed to more efficient ways to handle these patients are necessary to improve outcome of such a prevalent condition.Keywords
This publication has 11 references indexed in Scilit:
- Chronic Daily Headache in Taipei, Taiwan: Prevalence, Follow-Up and Outcome PredictorsCephalalgia, 2001
- Clinical presentation of transformed migraine: possible differences among male and female patients.Cephalalgia, 2001
- Epidemiology of Chronic Daily Headache in the General PopulationHeadache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 1999
- Prevalence of Frequent Headache in a Population SampleHeadache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 1998
- Classification of daily and near-daily headachesNeurology, 1996
- Classification of Daily and Near‐Daily Headaches: Proposed Revisions to the IHS CriteriaHeadache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 1994
- Transformed migraineCephalalgia, 1993
- Evaluation of Chronic Daily Headache—Comparison to Criteria for Chronic Tension-Type HeadacheCephalalgia, 1992
- Daily Chronic Headache: Classification And Clinical Features. Observation On 250 PatientsCephalalgia, 1987
- Transformed or Evolutive MigraineHeadache: The Journal of Head and Face Pain, 1987