engleski

Prevalence of chronic headache in Croatia

BACKGROUND: Chronic headache describes the presence of headache for >15 days per month on average for >3 months and fulfills the rest of the IHS criteria. The prevalence of chronic headache is within the range of 0.5-7.3% worldwide. The aim of this study was to determine the 1-year prevalence of chronic headache in adult Croatian population. METHODS: The data were collected from a cross-sectional survey of an adult population (>18 years of age) sample. Randomly selected patients from the general population in four Croatian cities were asked to fulfill a self-completed questionnaire. The prevalence of chronic headache was calculated in the sample representing 3, 383, 769 Croatian adults. RESULTS: The total sample included 1542 responders among which 616 were with headache. The 1-year prevalence of chronic headache was 2.4%, and 0.9% of responders declared having headache 30 days per month. According to these results, 81, 192 adult inhabitants in Croatia suffer from chronic headache. CONCLUSIONS: The prevalence of chronic headache in Croatia is comparable to other countries worldwide. These patients require special attention and should be offered multidisciplinary medical support.

headache

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