Assessing and treating primary headaches and cranio-facial pain in patients undergoing rehabilitation for neurological diseases

• Main Authors: Cristina Tassorelli, Marco Tramontano, Mariangela Berlangieri, Vittorio Schweiger, Mariagrazia D’Ippolito, Valerio Palmerini, Sara Bonazza, Riccardo Rosa, Rosanna Cerbo, Maria Gabriella Buzzi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: BMC 2017-09-01
• Series: The Journal of Headache and Pain
• Subjects: neurorehabilitation patients; primary headaches; cranio-facial pain; non-pharmacological treatment; psychological therapy; manual therapy
• Online Access: http://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s10194-017-0809-z

Abstract Background Pain is a very common condition in patient undergoing rehabilitation for neurological disease; however the presence of primary headaches and other cranio-facial pains, particularly when they are actually or apparently independent from the disability for which patient is undergoing rehabilitation, is often neglected. Diagnostic and therapeutic international and national guidelines, as well as tools for the subjective measure of head pain are available and should also be applied in the neurorehabilitation setting. This calls for searching the presence of head pain, independently from the rehabilitation needs, since pain, either episodic or chronic, interferes with patient performance by affecting physical and emotional status. Pain may also interfere with sleep and therefore hamper recovery. Methods In our role of task force of the Italian Consensus Conference on Pain in Neurorehabilitation (ICCPN), we have elaborated specific recommendations for diagnosing and treating head pains in patients undergoing rehabilitation for neurological diseases. Results and Conclusion In this narrative review, we describe the available literature that has been evaluated in order to define the recommendations and outline the needs of epidemiological studies concerning headache and other cranio-facial pain in neurorehabilitation.