Does your head hurt frequently? Six reasons to go to the doctor immediately

The is the term used to designate any headache. And this type of pain is the most common in humans.

According to data from the , up to 89% of the male population and 99% of the female population claim to suffer or have suffered from headaches at some point in their lives.

As specialists in neurology explain, there are more than 200 types of headachealthough they are divided into three large groups:

• Primary headaches: are those in which the in the nervous system.
• Secondary headaches: Caused by injuries to the nervous system or by other diseases.
• neuralgia: when the pain originates in the territory of a nerve.

As he explains Dr. Pablo IrimiaCoordinator of the Headache Study Group of the Spanish Society of Neurology.

“The and tension-type headache are the most common primary headache types.”

“The best known neuralgia is trigeminal neuralgia, which is caused by irritation of the trigeminal nerve that deals with facial sensation.”

“And, by way of example, among the secondary headaches we could highlight the headache that occurs as a consequence of a sinusitis or a brain hemorrhage.”

There are more than 200 types of headache.

When should I see a doctor?

Since most headaches are benign, when it comes to an occasional headache, it is not necessary to see a doctor.

However, when the pain becomes recurring, or prevents us from carrying out our daily lives normally, or when we suspect that it may be a symptom of a medical emergency, we must go to a consultation.

The neurologist details more how to identify a headache that must be diagnosed.

“When a person has a headache that starts suddenly sudden wayit’s a explosive painof great intensityproduces a great inabilityyouand starts for the first time when the patient is over 50 years of age, must be evaluated by a doctor. Because it can be a secondary headache, which in turn can be a medical emergency.”

“In any case, in more than 90% of cases, the headache is due to a primary headache, that is, it is a benign pain that is not associated with any type of brain injury.

But if someone needs to take painkillers very frequently, even if they think they control the pain well, or if, on the contrary, the pain limits their quality of life, in both cases it is time to see a doctor,” adds Dr. Irimia.

For many patients, headaches have a great impact on their daily lives.

Mild but very annoying headaches

We have already seen that according to the SEN data, most headaches are primary, that is, benign.

But this does not mean that they do not affect those who suffer from them. They do it a lot, to such an extent that they limit carrying out daily routines normally.

For many patients, headache attacks have a major impact on their daily functioning and can seriously affect various physical, emotional and/or social aspects. Something that becomes even more evident when the headache becomes chronic.

A primary headache is chronic when patients experience headaches more than 15 days a month and, according to data from the SEN, more than 4% of the Spanish population, that is, more than 2 million people, suffer from some type of headache. Primary chronic headache.

As Dr. Pablo Irimia points out:

“Excessive consumption of analgesics, suffering from depression or anxiety, and obesity are the factors that most frequently influence the chronification of a primary headache. On the other hand, migraine is the type of primary headache that tends to become chronic and, therefore, For this reason, about 50% of Spanish patients who suffer from a chronic headache suffer from migraine,”

Identify the headache to avoid chronification

There are many types of primary headaches that are diagnosed based on aspects such as the characteristics of the pain, its location, and the presence or absence of other associated symptoms.

But all of them are characterized because, with a correct diagnosis and treatment, without falling into self-medication, it is possible to control the disease and, above all, prevent it from becoming chronic.

Up to 46% of the Spanish population has some type of active headache. However, according to data from the SEN, more than 40% of patients who suffer from headaches with some recurrence are still undiagnosed. And about 50% of headache patients self-medicate with over-the-counter pain relievers. With the risk of chronification that this entails.

There are many pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments for primary headaches.

Treatments to avoid headache

“The first step for a correct approach to any primary headache is to identify the possible triggering factors. Aspects such as stress, changes in diet, the time spent sleeping, among many others, are aspects that can have a lot of influence on the appearance of a headache crisis”, explains Dr. Irimia.

Once these are identified headache triggers they can be controlled and avoided so that the headache does not start.

“But when this is not enough or when it comes to triggers that are difficult to avoid, it is time to correctly diagnose the disease to start treatment,” adds the specialist.

There are many pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments for headaches primaries.

• Some serve as preventative treatments, preventing headache crises from occurring.

• Others, on the other hand, are intended to mitigate pain when it appears.

But not all available treatments are valid for all types of headache, nor are they effective in all patients.

“Something that also characterizes primary headaches is that they have a great inter-individual variability. Even in patients with the same type of headache, there can be enormous differences in terms of possible triggers, in the frequency and intensity of pain and in the response to treatments“explains the neurologist.

“For that reason, when it is not a sporadic headache, It is important to insist on…