Prevalence of different types of headaches in adult onco-haematological patients before allogeneic haematopoietic stem cell transplantation

Abstract

The prevalence of various types of headaches in onco-haematological patients has been understudied so far. The aim of the study was to assess the prevalence of various types of primary and secondary headaches in oncohaematological patients before haematopoietic stem cell transplantation.Material and methods. We conducted a retrospective study of 65 adult (≥ 18 years old) onco-haematological patients. The history of primary and secondary types of headaches, total number of headache types in an individual, the relationship between the presence of headache and onco-haematological disease features, as well as the sensitivity and specificity of ID Migraine questionnaire were assessed.Results. A history of headache was found in 36 patients (55.4%). Among primary headaches, migraine was the most common (24.6%; n = 16). Among secondary headaches, post-dural puncture headache was the most prevalent (15.4%; n = 10). Almost a quarter of patients had 2 or more headache types (2 types were found in 16.92% of patients, 3 types were found in 6.15% of patients, 4 types were found in 1.54% of patients). No feature of oncohaematological disease was found to have a significant association with the presence of headache or a significant correlation with the number of headache types in an individual. The female sex increased the OR for the presence of primary headache (OR 0.23; 95% CI 0.06–0.86; p = 0.02). Sensitivity and specificity of ID Migraine™ questionnaire were found to be 90.9% (95% CI 58.7–99.8) and 58.3% (95% CI 27.7–84.8), respectively.Conclusion. More than half of onco-haematological patients referred for haematopoietic stem cell transplantation had a history of headache, the most common type being migraine. In our sample, screening with ID Migraine questionnaire had high sensitivity, but low specificity.