Headache 22 years after hospitalization for head injury compared with matched community controls.
OBJECTIVE
Little information is available on long-term headache following head injury. We compared the prevalence of headache in a cohort with previous hospitalization for head injury and matched controls.


METHODS
A questionnaire about headache was sent to 361 patients who were hospitalized for head injury in 1974-1975 and 722 matched community controls.


RESULTS
In multivariate conditional regression analysis among 192 responding case/control pairs, there was no evidence of higher odds of headache >or=1 day per month (odds ratio, OR 1.04, 95% CI 0.56-1.92, p = 0.90) compared with controls. However, there was a tendency to higher odds of headache >or=1 day per month among female cases than among controls (OR 2.03, 95% CI 0.94-4.39, p = 0.07).


CONCLUSIONS
The study could not show increased odds of headache in a cohort 22 years following hospitalization for head injury, but it is possible that females are more likely to report long-term headache following head injury than matched controls.
Nestvold
Knut
K
Norwegian Health Services Research Centre, Oslo, Norway. knut.nestvold@ahus.no
Stavem
Knut
K
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D015331:Cohort Studies; D006259:Craniocerebral Trauma / Q000150:complications*; D005260:Female; D006261:Headache / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006304:Health Status; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009664:Norway; D015995:Prevalence; D017678:Sex Distribution; D013997:Time Factors