Headaches and Sleep Disorders: New article in Cephalgia. Learn how Neuromuscular Dentistry and Sleep Dentistry can help relieve these problems.

A new article in Cephalgia discusses the comorbidities of sleep and headache. It is well established that the two most commmon causes of "Morning Headache" are TMJ disorders and Sleep Apnea. There is an excellent paper fron the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute on the relation of these two disorders. The paper "CARDIOVASCULAR AND SLEEP-RELATED CONSEQUENCES OF TEMPOROMANDIBULAR DISORDERS" can be found at www.nhlbi.nih.gov/meetings/workshops/tmj_wksp.pdf

The article in Cephalgia stated
Adults with severe headache are at significantly higher risk of also suffering from sleep problems, when compared with the general population, regardless of specific headache type. Optimal treatment of headache must include investigation for sleep disorders and vice versa."

The two primary sleep disorders associated with headache in my experience are sleep apnea and maintenance insomnia. Maintenance insomnia is usually the result of sleep apnea/ UARS (upper airway resistance syndrome) or restless legs (periodic leg movements in sleep PLMS)

Patients pesenting with severe stree frequently have sleep onset insomnia. Chronic pain frequently leads to stress(cortisol) disorders.

Treatment of Sleep Apnea is considered the Gold Standard for Sleep Apnea but most patients do not tolerate treat and abandon it completely (up to 60%) or more commonly use it only a few hours a night which is leaves significant residual disease and risks of cardiovascular disease, excessive daytime sleepiness, tiredness, headaches and migraines.

An excellent alternative treatment for sleep apnea is an oral appliance (http://www.ihatecpap.com) It is extremely effective for Upper Airway Resistances Syndrome, Snoring Arousals, and mild to moderate sleep apnea. It has been shown to be effective in severe sleep apnea but is usually not effectively in the morbidly obese. Morbidily obese patients with headaches and migraines are probably CPAP candidates but oral appliance therapy can be used if they do not tolerate CPAP.

Treatment of Sleep Disordered Breathing can be remrkably effective in treating many types of headaches, especially morning headaches. Oral Appliances are preferred by the majority patients over CPAP when they are offered a choice. A side effect of oral appliance therapy is bite changes. Exercises taught to patients can prevent most changes but many patients chose not to do the exercises. The reason is that when the jaw is advanced for 8 hours it "heals" in this new position frequently eliminating headaches and migraines. While dentists treating sleep apnea with oral appliances usually try to prevent bite changes dentists treating patients for TMJ disorders (TMD) chronic tension headaches and migraines actually welcome bite changes.

Daytime headaches are very effectively treated with a different type of oral appliance called a neuromuscular orthotic. If the headaches are eliminated a second phase of treatment can make these changes permanent. Understanding that TMD and Sleep Apnea are different faces of the same structural/developmental disorder.

Another pertinent and timely study J Headache Pain. 2011 Aug 17. "Clinical features of headache patients with fibromyalgia comorbidity." looks at chronic heqdaches and fibromyalgia comorbidities with tension headache, chronic daily headacahe and migraine. These are comorbidities to TMJ disorders (TMD) and problems of the Trigeminal Nervous system that is over one half of the total input to the brain.

Sleep disorders as well as tension-type headaches, chronic daily headaches and fibromyalgia can all be substantially improved in most patients with various types of oral orthopedic appliances that not only alter posture and airway but can change the autonomic overload from noxious stimuli into the trigeminal system. One appliance is specifically approved for migraine prevention.




Cephalalgia. 2011 Apr;31(6):648-53. Epub 2011 Jan 10.
Headaches and sleep problems among adults in the United States: findings from the National Comorbidity Survey-Replication study.
Lateef T, Swanson S, Cui L, Nelson K, Nakamura E, Merikangas K.
Source

National Institute of Mental Health, USA. TLateef@cnmc.org
Abstract
BACKGROUND:

Several studies have demonstrated an association between headache and disturbed sleep. None have examined this association across the headache spectrum. Our goal was to determine whether migraine and migraine with aura differ from nonmigraine headache in terms of associated insomnia complaints or severity of sleep problems.
METHODS:

A probability sample of US adults was used. A structured interview administered by trained interviewers was used. Diagnostic criteria for migraine and migraine with aura were based on the International Headache Society classification. The presence or absence of four forms of sleep disturbance associated with an insomnia diagnosis was ascertained.
RESULTS:

There was a significant association between frequent severe headache, including migraine with and without aura, and disordered sleep. Adults with headache reported more frequently difficulty initiating sleep (odds ratio [confidence interval] = 2.0 [1.6-2.5]), difficulty staying asleep (2.5 [2.1-3]), early morning awakening (2.0 [1.7-2.5]) and daytime fatigue (2.6 [2.2-3.2]) and also were more than twice as likely to report three or more of these symptoms(2.5 [2-3.1]) compared to the individuals without headache.
DISCUSSION:

Adults with severe headache are at significantly higher risk of also suffering from sleep problems, when compared with the general population, regardless of specific headache type. Optimal treatment of headache must include investigation for sleep disorders and vice versa.

PubMed abstracts below:

Comment in * Cephalalgia. 2011 Apr;31(6):643-4.

J Headache Pain. 2011 Aug 17. [Epub ahead of print]
Clinical features of headache patients with fibromyalgia comorbidity.
de Tommaso M, Federici A, Serpino C, Vecchio E, Franco G, Sardaro M, Delussi M, Livrea P.
Source

Neurophysiopathology of Pain Unit, Neurological and Psychiatric Sciences Department, Medical Faculty, Policlinico General Hospital, Aldo Moro University, Neurological Building, Piazza Giulio Cesare 11, 70124, Bari, Italy, m.detommaso@neurol.uniba.it.
Abstract

Our previous study assessed the prevalence of fibromyalgia (FM) syndrome in migraine and tension-type headache. We aimed to update our previous results, considering a larger cohort of primary headache patients who came for the first time at our tertiary headache ambulatory. A consecutive sample of 1,123 patients was screened. Frequency of FM in the main groups and types of primary headaches; discriminating factor for FM comorbidity derived from headache frequency and duration, age, anxiety, depression, headache disability, allodynia, pericranial tenderness, fatigue, quality of life and sleep, and probability of FM membership in groups; and types of primary headaches were assessed. FM was present in 174 among a total of 889 included patients. It prevailed in the tension-type headache main group (35%, p < 0.0001) and chronic tension-type headache subtype (44.3%, p < 0.0001). Headache frequency, anxiety, pericranial tenderness, poor sleep quality, and physical disability were the best discriminating variables for FM comorbidity, with 81.2% sensitivity. Patients presenting with chronic migraine and chronic tension-type headache had a higher probability of sharing the FM profile (Bonferroni test, p < 0.01). A phenotypic profile where headache frequency concurs with anxiety, sleep disturbance, and pericranial tenderness should be individuated to detect the development of diffuse pain in headache patients.

PMID:
21847547
[PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Labels: chronic daily headaches, dental sleep medicine, fibromyalgia tension type headaches, headaches migraines, insomnia migraines, migraines sleep, sleep apnea migraines

posted by Dr Shapira at 2:42 PM