Comparing the effectiveness of mindfulness-based therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy on reducing pain in patients with migraine headaches

The purpose of this study was to compare the effectiveness of mindfulness-based therapy with cognitive behavioral therapy in reducing pain in patients with migraine headaches. The research method was semi-experimental with a pre-test-post-test design and a one-month follow-up with a control group. The statistical population of the research was women suffering from chronic migraine headaches who had visited Sari hospitals in 1400. 45 people were selected by convenience sampling and randomly assigned to three groups (15 people in each group). The research tool included the short-form McGill pain questionnaire (SF-MPQ-2) by Dworkin et al. (2009). One group received mindfulness therapy and one group received cognitive behavioral therapy in 8 sessions (one session of 90 minutes each week). During the implementation of the research, the control group did not receive any intervention. Repeated measurement analysis of variance was used to analyze the data. The results showed that in the post-test and follow-up stage of pain intensity and its components (sensory perception of pain, emotional perception of pain, perception of pain evaluation, various pains), the mean of both experimental groups is lower than the control group (P<0.01) and the mean of the cognitive behavioral group is lower than the group of mindfulness-based therapy (P<0.05). The results of the research showed the preference for using cognitive behavioral therapy compared to mindfulness therapy to improve pain in patients with migraine headaches by psychologists and migraine headache treatment centers.