Investigation of the effects of coping skills training in individuals with migraine: A randomized controlled study

This study was planned to investigate the effects of coping skills training (CST) on pain, quality of life, disability level, coping skills, occupational performance and satisfaction level in individuals with migraine. In the study by 62 individuals with migraine, 31 randomly selected individuals received no training, while the other 31 received CST twice a week for 4 weeks. Pain severity of the participants were evaluated with the Visual Analog Scale, quality of life with the Nottingham Health Profile, disability levels with the Migraine Disability Assessment Scale, coping skills with the Coping Orientation to Problems Experienced Inventory-Short Form, and occupational performance and satisfaction levels with the Canadian Occupational Performance Measurement and their pre and post values were compared. As a result, improvement was observed in the CST group's pain severity (p=0.001), quality of life (p=0.001), disability level (p=0.001), coping skills (p=0.001), and occupational performance (p=0.001) and satisfaction levels (p=0.001). There were significant worsenings in the control group in emotional reactions (p=0.002), sleep (p=0.005), energy level (p=0.025), total (p=0.001) parameters in quality of life and in the use of informational support (p=0.017), planning (p=0.026) and venting (p=0.039) parameters in the coping skills and occupational performance (p=0.032) and satisfaction levels (p=0.018) while no significant difference was found in all other parameters in the study. It has been observed that CST reduces the pain severity and disability level of individuals. Despite these findings further studies are needed in terms of long-term effects of CST. In conclusion, it is thought that involvement of CST, which has a positive effect on quality of life, coping skills, occupational performance and satisfaction level, in the treatment of migraine would be beneficial. Keywords: Migraine, coping skills, pain, disability, occupational performance.