5 things you didn’t know about Migraines and Painkillers
Hello
This week I am going to tell you about the 5 things I learnt about migraine headaches and taking painkillers for migraines that you didn’t know
That taking opioids for migraines is extremely common
30% of all people that suffer from migraines either are currently taking opioid pain killers or have in the past.
Opioid pain killers are the strongest pain killers they can give you for pain. Things like Morphine, codeine and tramadol.
These types of pain killers are used for people who are in a lot of pain after surgery or a severe injury like a car accident. They are not meant to keep taking a long time because they are addictive.
Taking opioids for migraines makes people more disabled
In a study I found that looked at how common people with migraines take opioids they found that “Opioid use for migraine is associated with more severe headache-related disability, symptomology, comorbidities (depression, anxiety, and cardiovascular disease and events), and greater HRU for headache.”
HRU means healthcare resource utilisation, they go to doctors and hospitals for their headaches more often
That taking opioids for Migraines leads to you becoming twice as disabled as those that don’t
The same study I mentioned found that Headache-related disability (Migraine Disability Assessment sum scores) increased across groups as follows: nonusers: 7.8, previous users: 13.3, current non-dependent users: 19.1, and current probable dependence users: 44.4”
21 or higher means severe disability. As you can see from the score that they are double the 21 for severe headache induced disability.
The prevalence of depression and anxiety was highest among current users with probable opioid dependence.
Are you starting to see the link?
That taking opioids for migraines will lead to more headaches
The study found that “monthly headache frequency: nonusers: 3.2 days/month, previous users: 4.3 days/month, current non-dependent users: 5.6 days/month, and current probable dependence users: 8.6 days/month.”
As you can see from the findings that people who are dependent on opioid painkillers to manage their headaches have almost 2 times as many headaches in a month as those who aren’t.
And as for dependence. Dependence is when your headaches are so bad that if you do not take pills, you will not be able to do anything.
Do your headaches sound like that?
Do you want to stop having to take painkillers for headaches and get better?
Jason
