Ambulatory blood pressure monitoring findings in overweight and obese children with primary headache

Introduction and Aim: Primary headaches are recurrent headaches without underlying organic pathology. The prevalence of hypertension and primary headache has been reported to increase in obese patients. There is not any study in the literature evaluating blood pressure (BP) characteristics in children with obesity and primary headache. In this study, we aimed to investigate BP characteristics of obese or overweight children with primary headache and compare them with BP characteristics of those without headache. Materials and Methods: The study included obese or overweight children aged between 13-18 years who admitted to Bolu Abant İzzet Baysal University Faculty of Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Pediatric Nephrology and Pediatric Neurology polyclinics between January 2023 and January 2024. Children with body mass index (BMI) ≥85 percentile and primary headache constituted the study group, and those with BMI ≥85 percentile without headache constituted the control group. Results: The study included 60 patients (27 (45%) boys and 33 (55%) girls. According to office BP and ambulatory blood pressure monitoring (ABPM) findings there was no difference between the patient groups in terms of BP findings, laboratory findings and end-organ damage features. Conclusion: We suggest that BP features caused by obesity might mask BP features caused by primary headache in children with obesity or overweight and primary headache. We suggest that obese or overweight children with primary headache should be evaluated with office BP and ABPM. Key words: Child, overweight, obesity, primary headache, blood pressure