Prevalence of Headache in Patients with Multiple Sclerosis

Abstract

Background and purpose: Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a common neurological disease in young adults. This study was performed to determine the prevalence of headache in these patients. Materials and methods: This descriptive-analytic study was carried out using convenient sampling in patients attending neurology clinics affiliated to Mazandaran University of Medical Sciences, 2017. Data analysis was done in SPSS V24. Results: There were 129 MS patients with history of headache, of whom 41.1% had migraine and 56.6% had tension headache. Severe types of headaches were reported by 47% of the patients and migraine was found to have the highest incidence. There were significant correlations between relapsing-remitting MS and tension and migraine headaches (P=0.001). About half of the patients did not mention a history of headache before MS, and there was no relationship between the new migraine headache and its aura (P>0.05). Conclusion: In current study, tension headaches were found to be the most common types of headaches in MS patients. In relapsing-remitting MS, the most common type of headache was migraine. Given the adverse effects of headache on quality of life, awareness on the common types of headache could help in improving the quality of life of MS patients.

Keywords

• multiple sclerosis
• headache
• migraine
• aura