Are There Long Lasting Effects on Migraine Headache After One Series of Acupuncture Treatments?

Abstract

The long term effect of one series of acupunture treatments on migraine headache was investigated. Twenty-five patients (20 women, 5 men) with a mean migraine history of 22 years and a stable, severe migraine (mean frequency 8 days/28 days) completed the study, out of 30 days originally enrolled. The patients recorded the presence, severity and duration of headache as well as drug consumption during three 12 weeks long periods: one pretreatment period (baseline period = BP), follow up period I (FU I) immediately following the treatment period of 6-8 weeks and follow up period II (FU II) starting the 25th post treatment week. An index for migrainous headache was calculated for each 28 days period (number of days times severity rated, 1, 2 or 3). Acupuncture was given close to or in the region of the headache. During FU I and FU II the migraine index had decreased 40% and 39%, respectively, compared to BP (to 10.3 and 10.5 from 17.2), giving a statistical signficance with p<0.01. The number of days with migraine headache was reduced 35 and 34% respectively, during FU I and FU II to 5.1 to 5.2 from 8.0 days/28 days during BP. This reduction is signicant too with p<0.05 and was responsible for almost the whole reduction of the index. Thus the severity of the pain was not much changed. On the individual basis 7 of the 25 patients obtained a very large reduction of migraine headache. Their index was down to 3.6 and 2.1 during FU I and FU II from 20.8 during BP. In 11 patients the treatments gave no benefits. In general a good effect during FU I lasted throughtout and FU II, i.e. for at least 9 months. In the 14 patients with non-migrainous headache a decrease of 33 and 20%, respectively, was recorded to an index of 8.5 and 10.5 from 12.7 before treatment. The reduction during FU I gave a p-value of <0.05, but the reduction during FU II was not stastically significant. In conclusion, acupuncture treatments appear to give a long lasting reduction of severe migraine headache in some patients, whereas other patients get no benefit at all treatments. The present study does not show, however, if that is a specific affect of the acupuncture needling itself.