A new study found that neglected or abused children are more likely to experience episodes of migraines during adulthood.
Study leader Dawn C. Buse, who is also director of behavior at the Montefiore Headache Center and associate professor of clinical neurology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, and her colleagues looked at the data of 9,734 adults to determine the link between child abuse and migraine. The participants completed a survey detailing their history of abuse such as emotional abuse, emotional neglect and sexual abuse.
Eighty-five percent of the participants said that they have experienced migraines while 15 percent said they had tension headaches.
The study concluded that 25 percent of those who experienced emotional abuse had migraine compared to 21 percent of those who had tension headache. Those who were emotionally abused until age 18 were 33 percent more likely to suffer from migraine than tension headache. The rate increased to 50 percent when sexual abuse and emotional neglect were combined, according to Medical News Today.
The results were consistent even after considering the participants' ages, gender, race, depression and anxiety levels, and income.
"Childhood maltreatment can have long-lasting effects like associated medical and psychological conditions, including migraine, in adulthood. When managing patients with migraine, neurologists should take childhood maltreatment into consideration," Buse said in news release.
The researchers clarified that even if they found a link between migraine and abuse, they do not suggest that abuse was the cause of headaches, HealthDay News reported.
This study was published in the Dec. 24 issue of the journal Neurology.
