Recently Duke University completed a study on treatments for tension and cervicogenic headaches. Their results were very interesting and presented some good news for chiropractic patients.
Evidence Report:
Behavioral and Physical Treatments
for Tension-type and Cervicogenic
Headache
Tension-type headache and cervicogenic headache are two of the most common non migraine headaches. Population-based studies suggest that a large proportion of adults experience mild and infrequent (once per month or less) tension-type headaches, and that the one-year prevalence of more frequent headaches (more than once per month) is 20%-30%; a smaller percentage of the population (roughly 3%) has been estimated to have chronic tension-type headache population. This agrees with an earlier clinic-based study which found that 14% of headache patients treated had cervicogenic headache.
Physical treatments, like Chiropractic, is aimed at the prevention of headache episodes rather than the alleviation of symptoms once an attack has begun. If effective and available, these non-pharmacological treatments may be the first choice for most patients and may also be well suited for the significant minority of patients who: (a) have poor tolerance of pharmacological treatments; (b) have medical contraindications for pharmacological treatments; (c) experience insufficient relief from, or are unresponsive to, pharmacological treatment; (d) wish to become pregnant (or are nursing); (e) have a history of long-term, frequent, or excessive use of analgesic or abortive medications that can aggravate headache problems; or (f) simply prefer to avoid medication use.