title: A community-based study of headache diagnosis and prevalence in Singapore.
abstract: We present the results of a community survey based on the diagnostic criteria of the International Headache Society (IHS) describing headache prevalence and symptomatology in the Singapore population. A questionnaire administered by trained personnel was completed by 2096 individuals from a randomized sample of 1400 households. The overall lifetime prevalence of headache was 82.7%. The migraine prevalence was 2.4% in males and 3.6% in females; for episodic tension-type headache and chronic tension-type headache the corresponding figures were 11.1%/11.8% and 0.9%/1.8%, respectively. Inclusion of borderline cases (IHS codes 1.7 and 2.3) resulted in prevalences of 9.3% for migraine, 39.9% for episodic tension headache and 2.4% for chronic tension headache. Headaches described by 31.2% of the respondents were unclassifiable. The different premonitory symptoms, precipitants and aggravating factors in migraine and tension-type headache in our study population suggest that they represent two distinct syndromes rather than opposite ends of a clinical spectrum.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore. mdchokh@leonis.nus.edu.sg
authors.forename: K-H
authors.initials: KH
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.forename: B K-C
authors.initials: BK
authors.lastname: Ong
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D002648:Child; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D020773:Headache Disorders / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008875:Middle Aged; D012737:Sex Factors; D012846:Singapore / Q000453:epidemiology