Migraine

Study Assesses Migraine Treatment Shortfalls and Related Disability

Researchers have identified 4 areas in which the acute treatment needs of persons who take medications for migraines are not being met and assessed the migraine-related disability related to these unmet needs.

The research team administered a 13-item validated survey—the Migraine in America Symptoms and Treatment (MAST) Study Unmet Treatment Needs (MUTN) questionnaire—to people in the United States who were 18 or older and who were treating their acute migraines with prescription drugs. Participation was limited to persons with 1 or more days of migraine per month in the past 3 months who used oral acute medications (nasal and injectable medication users were excluded).

The 15,133 study participants responded to each of the 13 survey items using a 5-point scale ranging from 1 (never) to 5 (all or nearly all of the time). A total of 3,930 of the migraineur participants (mean age, 45 years  ± 13.5; 73.6% women; 81.6% white) reported the current use of acute oral prescription medication for pain (mean age 45.0 ± 13.5, 73.6% women, 81.6% Caucasian).

The 4 most commonly reported unmet migraine treatment needs were as follows:

  • Severe headache attacks come on very rapidly (52.8%)
  • Attacks reach peak intensity in less than 30 minutes (50.4%)
  • Severe headache is present upon awakening (40.9%)
  • Pain returns within 24 hours after initial pain relief (38.6%)

Based on these results, the researchers identified identified 4 “unique domains of unmet treatment need” among the participants: nausea interference, disturbed sleep, lack of pain freedom, and rapid onset of attacks. They noted that moderate‐to‐severe disability rates increased in a clear linear pattern with participants’ increasing mean scores on the 5-point MUTN scale.

“More effective acute treatments are needed to address these domains of unmet need and to reduce disability” related to migraines, the researchers concluded.

The study’s findings were presented at the 60th Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Headache Society, held June 28 through July 1, 2018, in San Francisco. The abstract was published in the journal Headache on June 27.

—Michael Gerchufsky

Reference:

Lipton RB, Munjal S, Alam A, et al. Assessing unmet treatment needs and associated disability in persons with migraine: results from Migraine in America Symptoms and Treatment (MAST) study [American Headache Society Annual Scientific Meeting abstract OR02]. Headache. 2018;58(suppl 2):63-64. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/head.13306. Accessed July 2, 2018.