MONTREAL, June 22 (UPI) -- The beginning of the week -- Mondays, Tuesdays and
Wednesday -- brings the most migraine attacks among adolescents, doctors report
Thursday at a major headache research meeting in Montreal.
About 20 percent of children aged 11 to 17 reported that the debilitating
headaches, often accompanied by nausea and extreme sensitivity to sound, light
and movement, said their headaches occurred on Monday, but only about 9 percent
of the headaches were reported on Saturday. "We don't know the reason for these
differences," said Dr. Paul Winner, co-director of the Palm Beach Headache
Center, West Palm Beach, Fla., "but something is going on here. We think that
anxiety over school might play a role."
Winner and colleagues in many center across the United States studied the
occurrences of the headaches in 1,932 adolescents. He said the researchers don't
believe the children were malingering to get out of attending school. "They were
reporting symptoms that adolescents would not be expected to be aware of," such
as pain involved in movement, Winner said. "When a migraine headache is worsened
by activity, that is a disabling type of headache."
He will report his findings this week at the annual scientific meeting of the
American Headache Society.
Winner said another possible cause of the migraines in the early part of the
week might be due to changing sleeping patterns. "We know that a lack of sleep
can trigger migraines in adults," he said.
School-aged children may be going to sleep late and walking up early on
weekdays, which sets them up for the headaches. On Saturdays, the children tend
to sleep longer and later.
He said the pattern of migraine for children also differs in that the
adolescents have migraines between the hours of 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. Winner said
many adults report migraines throughout the day and night. "Often patients tell
me that they were awakened in the middle of the night with a migraine headache,"
he said. "But we didn't see that as often with adolescents." About 73 percent of
the migraines occur during daylight hours among the adolescents, he said.
Other differences between children and adults include a similarity in sex. Among
adults, women suffer the headaches far more than men; in the group that Winner
studied about 54 percent were girls; 46 percent were boys. Why girls tend to
carry the migraines over into adulthood and boys do not is another puzzle the
scientists are trying to figure out.
"There are a lot of things we just don't know about children and migraine
headaches," Winner said. "There is so little data in this age group."
"We have the potential to try and find out what is going on Sundays that makes
the children susceptible to migraine adolescents," he said. Winner also said
that children shouldn't have to suffer all day with the headaches. "We have
excellent medications now that can provide complete pain relief within two
hours," he said. "We can treat the headache and let the kids get back to school
the same day."
