Should we educate about the risks of medication overuse headache?

The Journal of Headache and Pain

Short Report

Ravi P Ganepola¹  John DC Dereix¹  James TF Lai¹  Paul N Aveyard²  Kiera A Markey³  Alexandra J Sinclair³  Peter G Nightingale⁴ 

[1] Department of Medical Education, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK;Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK;Neurotrauma and Neurodegeneration, School of Clinical and Experimental Medicine, College of Medical and Dental Sciences, University of Birmingham, B15 2TT, Birmingham, UK;Wellcome Trust Clinical Research Facility, Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham, UK;

关键词: Medication-overuse headache;    Analgesia;    Headache;    Prevention;    Education;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1129-2377-15-10

 received in 2013-11-26, accepted in 2014-02-05,  发布年份 2014

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundMedication-overuse headache (MOH) is caused by the regular use of medications to treat headache. There has been a lack of research into awareness of MOH. We distributed an electronic survey to undergraduate students and their contacts via social networking sites. Analgesic use, awareness of MOH, perceived change in behaviour following educational intervention about the risks of MOH and preferred terminology for MOH was evaluated.Findings485 respondents completed the questionnaire (41% having received healthcare training). 77% were unaware of the possibility of MOH resulting from regular analgesic use for headache. Following education about MOH, 80% stated they would reduce analgesic consumption or seek medical advice. 83% indicated that over the counter analgesia should carry a warning of MOH. The preferred terminology for MOH was painkiller-induced headache.ConclusionsThis study highlights the lack of awareness of MOH. Improved education about MOH and informative packaging of analgesics, highlighting the risks in preferred lay terminology (i.e. painkiller-induced headache), may reduce this iatrogenic morbidity and warrants further evaluation.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Lai et al.; licensee Springer. 2014. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited.