title: Occipital nerve stimulation for headache: mechanisms and efficacy.
abstract: Headache disorders are common problems in medicine and it is this commonness that often provides an air of the simple or obvious. Patients expect doctors understand headache; indeed doctors expect they may understand headache, and in turn since simple treatments exist and can be purchased from a supermarket, the very concept of the difficult headache problem has a pejorative connotation. A decade ago none of the authors were using device-based therapies to any substantial extent, and now hardly a week goes by when we will not see a patient who has considerable potential to benefit from such approaches. Here we cover the most promising of the device-based approaches, neurostimulation therapy using occipital nerve stimulation. Far from proven and with much work to be done, this is an exciting potential development for patients and doctors. Other device-based therapies, such as deep brain stimulation for cluster headache and patent foramen ovale closure, are covered elsewhere.
authors.affiliation: Headache Group, Institute of Neurology, The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Queen Square, London, UK.
authors.forename: Peter J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Goadsby
authors.forename: Thorsten
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Bartsch
authors.forename: David W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Dodick
mesh_terms: D003391:Cranial Nerves / Q000502:physiology* / Q000528:radiation effects*; D004599:Electric Stimulation Therapy; D006261:Headache / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans