A personalized approach to the treatment of chronic tension-type headache: quality of life of patients

Abstract

Objective: to evaluate the quality of life in a personalized approach to the treatment of chronic tension-type headache (CTTH) in comparison with a standard treatment protocol.Material and methods. The study involved 61 patients with CTTH. Patients were randomly divided into two groups. The first (main) group consisted of patients (n=30) who received a personalized approach with a psychotherapist contributing to the treatment. The comparison group consisted of patients (n=31) who were treated according to a standard protocol with counselling and observation by a neurologist. Pain intensity was assessed using the visual analogue pain scale (VAS). The SF-36 questionnaire was used to assess quality of life. Differences between the groups were analyzed by assessing individual changes in eight different domains of the SF-36 questionnaire for each patient.Results. In the main group, parameters characterizing the physical (pain intensity) and emotional experience of the pain (mental health, social functioning, life activity; p<0.05) decreased after 6 months of treatment when a personalized approach to the treatment of CTTH was applied, compared to the control group (with a standard patient management protocol).Conclusion. The personalized approach showed an improvement of the quality of life of patients with CTTH compared with the standard protocol, allowing us to recommend it for a wider application in clinical practice.