Psychiatric disorders and pain location in unilateral migraineurs

Abstract

To explore the relationship between the side of pain during attacks and psychopathological features in strictly unilateral migraine, we recruited 35 patients affected by migraine with and/or without aura diagnosed according to the revised ICHD-II criteria. Seventeen patients had right side-locked pain (R-SUM), 11 had left side-locked (L-SUM) and 7 had side-shifting pain (SSM). Patients were administered the Hamilton Anxiety Scale, the State and Trait Anxiety Inventory-State Anxiety, the Beck Depression Inventory and the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale. Statistical analyses showed that the L-SUM group was significantly more anxious and depressed than the other two groups of patients. Our preliminary data suggest that strictly left unilateral migraine is associated with more severe anxiety and depression. This finding appears to be consistent with studies that reported a higher degree of these disorders in patients with left cerebral hemispheric damage

Tinnitus Patients with Comorbid Headaches: The Influence of Headache Type and Laterality on Tinnitus Characteristics

“…The finding of higher impairment of patients with left-sided symptoms is in line with the literature that shows a slight left-sided preponderance (55–60%) in somatoform disorders ( 38 ) and in somatoform pain ( 39 ). With respect to headaches, a relatively small study suggests that left-sided migraine is more frequently associated with psychiatric symptoms than right-sided migraine ( 40 ). Thus, among tinnitus patients with left-sided headaches, there might be a higher proportion of patients with a somatoform disorder, which can explain the higher impairment in this group.…”

Personality in patients with migraine evaluated with the "Temperament and Character Inventory"

“…The main limitation is the lack of a standardised interview to rule out psychiatric conditions in order to perform a correlation with the TCI domains. It is possible that harm avoidance could be related with depression and anxiety disorders, especially in PWM, where the comorbidity with psychiatric conditions is high [52][53][54][55][56][57][58][59]. Also, the lack of a standardised interview avoids a potential comparison between some groups of interest such as patients with aura, where the prevalence of psychiatric conditions is reportedly higher [56,57].…”

Comorbidity of pain and anxiety disorders

“…Some painful conditions also may have a direct biological relationship with the mental disorders with which they are comorbid. For example, some authors have demonstrated an association between left unilateral migraine and more severe anxiety (and depressive) disorder, implying a possible direct vascular origin for the anxiety [ 29 ].…”