Do you know the eight reasons for frequent headaches?

Author: Chen Haibo, chief physician of Beijing Hospital

Reviewer: Hu Wenli, Chief Physician, Beijing Chaoyang Hospital, Capital Medical University

Everyone may experience headaches in their lifetime. An occasional headache may not have much impact on our lives, but if you have headaches frequently, you should pay attention.

There are many causes of headaches, let’s take a look.

1. Migraine

If a young woman suffers from frequent headaches, a common disease is called migraine.

The main characteristics of a migraine are often a swollen pain on one side or the whole head, and even a throbbing pain. Sometimes before the pain, there will be visual abnormalities, such as seeing stars, or seeing things distorted or with ripples, which is called a migraine with aura.

In addition, this type of migraine often has a family history, and her sisters and parents may have a similar medical history. This is a characteristic of migraine, also called vascular migraine.

Of course, migraines are not only seen in young women, because as people age, they can also have migraines in their 40s and 50s, and some people will gradually get better after they are 60 or 70 years old. In addition, men can also have migraines.

2. Hypertension

If an older person experiences headaches, such as someone in their 50s or 60s or 70s, and they rarely had headaches before but now have headaches, the most common cause may be high blood pressure.

This type of headache is often persistent. As long as the blood pressure is high, the pain will continue. The head will often feel groggy and some people may experience dizziness.

So for patients like this, we first measure their blood pressure. If the blood pressure is indeed high, they should be given antihypertensive treatment first. After the blood pressure returns to normal levels, the headache will go away. This can also verify that the headache is caused by high blood pressure.

3. Tension headache

Some patients always feel their neck is tight, their head is swollen, as if they are wearing a hoop on their head, and their hair is heavy. Such feelings are often related to tension in the head and neck muscles.

Due to various reasons, such as emotional tension, poor sleep due to the inappropriate height of the pillow at night, cervical spondylosis, etc., local muscle tension will occur.

Prolonged tension will cause muscle contraction, making it impossible for the metabolic products produced by the muscles to be metabolized through the blood vessels in time. These acidic products are deposited in the muscles and will cause muscle soreness, pain and other symptoms. This is muscle tension pain.

4. Neuralgia

Some patients feel a throbbing pain when they have a headache. For example, they suddenly feel a severe throbbing pain behind the ear, like a spike, or a knife cutting, or like lightning, which passes suddenly and they don't know when the pain will come back.

Some patients will feel a twitch in the head when the pain occurs, that is, they feel a sudden pain in this place, and they can see that it has occurred, which means that the pain is very severe. If you press the painful area at this time, you will also feel pain. This kind of headache is often a kind of neuralgia.

The most common site for this type of neuralgia is the back of the head, where the muscles behind the head and neck meet. In traditional Chinese medicine, this is called Fengchi acupoint.

Figure 1 Original copyright image, no permission to reprint

As you can understand from the name, Fengchi is a place that is easily affected by wind. So if this place gets cold or blown by wind, it will cause inflammation of the nerves in this place and cause pain.

5. Trigeminal neuralgia

The trigeminal nerve is divided into three branches: the ophthalmic branch, the maxillary branch, and the mandibular branch. If any of the three branches is affected, it may manifest as pain in the head and face.

This kind of pain sometimes has a trigger point, just like pulling the trigger of a pistol, it fires once each time you pull it, so it hurts every time you touch it. This is called a trigger point.

For example, the corners of the mouth often hurt when touched. Many patients dare not wash their faces because it hurts when they wash their faces, and dare not brush their teeth because it hurts when they brush their teeth. As a result, the skin in this area becomes rough and it is very difficult to eat. This kind of pain is called trigeminal neuralgia.

6. Sinusitis

Maxillofacial pain in the head and face, that is, pain in the forehead and maxillary area, may be related to sinusitis.

The frontal sinus and maxillary sinus are sinuses. If there is inflammation inside, it can cause pain in the forehead and maxillary area, so the pain in this area may be caused by sinusitis.

7. Glaucoma

When glaucoma attacks, it can cause pain in the head and face. This is because the intraocular pressure of glaucoma is too high, which causes swelling and pain in the eyes and pain in the head and face.

When we examine the affected eye, we can find that the pupil of the affected eye is enlarged. In addition, the pupil's reaction to light is also slightly worse. In addition, when we gently press the two eyes, we can clearly feel that the tension of the painful eye is higher.

8. Headaches caused by other reasons

There are some other reasons, such as simple bad mood, depression, anxiety caused by headache, often called neuralgic headache. Some neuralgic headaches exist for a long time, and there is no clear cause. The pain is not fixed, sometimes here, sometimes there, sometimes heavier, sometimes lighter. This is the characteristic of neuralgic headaches.

Of course, some intracranial lesions, such as intracranial tumors, inflammation, or larger hemangiomas, can also cause headaches.

Figure 2 Original copyright image, no permission to reprint

So there are many reasons for headaches, and we need to understand the nature of the pain. If it is a throbbing pain, it is often related to vascular headaches. If it is a needle-like pain or a burning pain, it often indicates nerve damage. So different natures and different ages often have different causes of pain.