Post-COVID headaches

Headache is a common symptom of any infectious illness, including COVID. A group of Spanish researchers analyzed six published studies of headaches in adult Spanish COVID patients.

According to their review, headache is an early symptom of COVID. It typically lasts two weeks. Patients in these studies were followed for up to a year. One out of five patients had developed a headache that persisted for at least a year. Women and older patients were more likely to be affected. This persistent headache most often resembled chronic migraine. The pain was throbbing with associated sensitivity to light and noise, and worsening with physical activity.  The authors did not observe a difference between patients with and without prior history of headache. Patients with more intense headaches were more likely to develop a chronic headaches.

The published studies reviewed by the authors did not address the treatment of headaches. Considering that the persistent headaches resembled migraines, we tend to treat them as we do chronic migraines. This means the use of antidepressants, epilepsy drugs, blood pressure medications, Botox, triptans, and CGRP drugs (both oral and injectable). It is likely that with early and aggressive treatment, many patients would not have headaches persist for such a long time. Doctors in Europe are less likely to prescribe medications and use Botox in headache patients than we are in the US.

COVID vaccination also carries a risk of developing persistent headaches. As mentioned in a previous post, people who received Pfizer or Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine were twice as likely to develop a headache as those who received the placebo. The headache in these patients also tended to resemble migraine.