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Drug-induced headache affects mainly women, it also happens more often to smokers, coffee drinkers and people who frequently drink alcohol. Experts believe that this type of headache can affect up to 15 percent of all headache patients who overuse their medications. What medications cause a headache?
Drug-induced headache(the so-called rebound headache) is a side effect of using various medications, but most of all painkillers that we take because of a headache. Quite often it also turns out that it is not one drug that is the cause of drug-induced headaches, but a combination of several preparations.
Drug-induced headache: causes
Drug-induced headache appears paradoxically primarily in patients who take large amounts of painkillers, which most often contain:
- ergotamine and triptans used to treat migraine
- non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs
- opioid drugs (e.g. codeine)
Specialists also emphasize the importance of the patient's individual tendency to the appearance of such ailments. It's also important that some of the pain medications are addictive when overused, resulting in daily headaches.
In addition, drug-induced headaches may occur in patients taking vasodilators for coronary artery disease, hypertension, or peripheral vascular disease. Oral contraceptives can also trigger migraine attacks.
Drug headache: diagnosis
Drug-induced headache is not easy to diagnose - it requires honesty from the patient.
- the headache occurs for more than 15 days a month and also meets criteria 2 and 3
- Patient has been regularly abusing one or more medications for more than 3 months because of acute and / or symptomatic headache
- headache develops or increases significantly as a result of drug abuse
- the headache disappears or returns to its original character 2 months after stopping the drug abuse
Drug headache: treatment
The only treatment is to discontinue overused painkillers, which should result in some time laterreducing the frequency and severity of headache. In the case of headache caused by other medications, it is often enough to change the dosage or use a different preparation.