Weather changes may cause headaches

Some people may develop severe headaches when the temperature rises or atmospheric pressure drops.Researchers from United Kingdom studied 7054 subjects having headache to identify the role of changing weather and air pollution for triggering the headache. Temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, fine particular matter, black carbon, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen content in the atmosphere were recorded during three 24-hour proceeding sessions. On comparison, the risk of migraine and non-migraine headaches was found to trigger along with temperature. The risk increased by 8 percent for every 5-degree Celsius increase in temperature. The trend was seen during warm and cold months alike. Similarly, the risk of non-migraine headaches increased during the 2 to 3 days following a drop in barometric pressure. Low barometric pressure generally means cloudy skies and storms, while high pressure means clear skies. But no one knows why temperature spikes and pressure dips might contribute to headaches.

The findings suggest that weather changes may indeed be a headache trigger, but no strong evidence of connection between air pollution and headache was found by using the data on daily air pollution concentrations. However, there was some evidence that non-migraine headaches are associated with one particular pollutant, nitrogen dioxide. Larger studies are, therefore, required to clarify the effect of air pollution on headaches.

COMMENT