Investigation of pain characteristics and accompanying anxiety-depression symptoms in patients with headache

Introduction and Purpose: Headaches are one of the most common complaints. It causes comorbid conditions such as migraine and tension-type headaches, depression and anxiety disorders. Headache affects treatment compliance in psychiatric disorders. In our study, we aimed to reveal the symptoms of depression and anxiety disorders in patients with headache. Materials and Methods: The study was planned in a cross-sectional descriptive style. Ethics committee approval was received for the study. 311 patients participated in the study. A questionnaire including descriptive characteristics, headache clinical features, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and Beck Anxiety Scale (BAI) was administered to the participants. Statistical analysis of the data was done in SPSS 27.0. Results: In our study, 54.7% of the patients were between the ages of 18-30, 60.1% were women, 82% were high school graduates, 79.7% were students, 54.7% were married, 57% were married. 6 of them were in good economic condition, 63% did not smoke and 61.1% did not drink alcohol. 31.8% of the patients stated that they experienced a headache for 1-2 hours, 36.7% stated that the pain was in the forehead area, 62.4% stated that the pain was throbbing, 40.5% stated that the pain was slightly severe, and 56% stated that the pain was a bit severe. 3% of them stated that pain can occur at any time and 47.9% stated that they experience pain 2-3 times a month. The average scores of the patients on BDI were 14.34±9.5 and on BAI were 13.65±12.3. The BDI and BAI scores of female patients were found to be higher than those of male patients (p<0.001, p<0.001, respectively). The BDI and BAI scores of smoker patients were found to be higher than those of non-smokers (p<0.001, p=0.013, respectively). A statistically high positive correlation was found between the patients' headache duration, severity, frequency of attacks, and frequency of painkiller use and their BDI and BAI scores (p<0.001). Conclusion and Recommendations: It has been determined that female gender, smoking, severe headache, long duration and high attack frequency increase the severity of depression and anxiety. The presence of a psychiatric disease should be kept in mind in patients presenting with headache. Keywords: Primary headaches, Migraine, Tension-type headache, Depression, Anxiety