Achieving Success with Your Chosen Headache Medication
Step 1: Follow the agreed treatment plan.
During the office visit, you will need to agree with your physician that the treatment plan is right for you. If you to not agree that the medication is right for you, or if you have concerns about the medication, please make sure you tell your doctor so you can discuss the recommendations and what might be appropriate in exchange.
Step 2: Avoid under and overuse of medicines
Because headaches come back, often on a regular basis, medicines should be taken as directed. If overused, many headache medications will cause an increase in headaches, even leading to a syndrome called chronic daily headache. Sometimes the headache medication along with other drugs such as caffeine, lead to a worsening in headache frequency and intensity. If you feel this is occurring, call your physician immediately, so you can break the cycle of headache rebound and chronic daily headache.
Step 3: Maintain your headache hygiene.
In order for headache medications to work and a treatment plan to be successful, you must assume responsibility for taking care of your own illness. This means engage in good "headache hygiene." This often sounds easier than it is and requires you to be disciplined in several areas of your life. Help yourself succeed by giving your medications a good chance of working for you.
Acute or Preventive
The medicines discussed in Understanding Your Medicines are all for occasional use and are known as "acute" (or "abortive") treatments for headache, since they are used to stop (or "abort") a headache attack in progress. If you find you have frequent, disabling headaches, you may be a candidate for "preventive" medicines that can reduce both the frequency of your headaches and can make any "breakthrough" headaches less severe and easier to treat.
Assessing your headache treatment needs:
Are you using your medications more than 1-2 times a week on average?
Do you have 3 or more severe, hard-to-treat attacks per month?
Do you dislike the acute therapies you have tried?
Do you have infrequent but very severe and disabling attacks?
Do you have headaches that are predictable such as:
Headaches that increase in frequency during stressful events such as travel, holidays, or tax season?
Do you miss work, social events, or family activities because of headaches?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, you may benefit from a preventive therapy for your migraine.
Many physicians have a variety of different preventive therapies they use in their patients. Selecting one may be based on your health history, presence of other existing conditions, or the clinical experience of the physician.
Reprinted from the web site of the American Council for Headache Education (www.achenet.org)
