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Migraine Prevalence Higher in Adolescents With Bipolar Disorder
Migraine headaches are significantly more common in adolescents with bipolar disorder compared with healthy controls, suggests a study published in Bipolar Disorders.
“There is substantial evidence of increased prevalence of migraines, and negative psychiatric correlates of migraines, in adults with bipolar disorder,” explained researchers from the Center for Youth Bipolar Disorder at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Center, Toronto, Canada. “Given the paucity of data on this topic in youth, we investigated the prevalence and correlates of migraine in a large sample of adolescents with bipolar disorder.”
Researchers compared the occurrence of nonmigraine headaches and migraine headaches, differentiated using the validated ID-Migraine 3-item screener, in 165 adolescents with bipolar disorder and 89 healthy controls.
Migraine headaches were markedly more prevalent among adolescents with bipolar disorder (38.2%) compared with healthy controls (3.4%). The study identified an adjusted odds ratio of 14.76.
“[T]he magnitude of this association exceeds what has been reported in adult samples,” researchers noted.
The prevalence of nonmigraine headaches, on the other hand, did not differ between the two groups.
Among adolescents with bipolar disorder, correlates of migraine were similar to those previously identified among adults. They included female sex, bipolar disorder II or bipolar disorder not otherwise specified subtypes, less severe worst past functioning, higher past depression severity, higher self-reported affective lability, higher body mass index, and less use of lithium and second-generation antipsychotics.
“Future prospective studies are warranted to evaluate temporal associations between migraine and mood symptoms,” researchers wrote, “and to evaluate neurobiological and cardiovascular underpinnings of these associations.”
—Jolynn Tumolo
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