Interdisciplinary Outpatient Group Treatment of Intractable Headache

Approximately 10% of adults suffer from severe or disabling headaches. For many patients, headaches are reduced with traditional medical, physical, or psychological therapies. However, a significant minority continue to report debilitating headaches despite the use of these conventional therapies. An integrated, interdisciplinary approach combining these three individual components in a group treatment setting was offered to patients who had failed previous therapy. The interdisciplinary treatment resulted in over 70% of patients experiencing a 50% or better reduction in headaches at follow-up of an average of 5.8 months. Overall, there was an average reduction in medication use at follow-up of 71%. The treated group reported significantly greater reduction in headache activity and medication consumption compared to a group that was referred to but did not receive group treatment. The results suggest that an interdisciplinary outpatient group treatment may provide a cost-effective and time-efficient treatment option for patients with a variety of recurring headaches, even if they have failed conventional therapies that use medical, physical, and psychological treatments individually.