A Survey on Headache Severity and Medications Requested by Patients Visiting Day-and-Night Pharmacy in Babol (Iran)

Headache is the most common type of pain syndrome. About 90% of the whole population has headache attack at least once a year. Severe disabling headache affects 40% of the population worldwide. This study was designed to evaluate the severity of headache and types of drugs requested by affected patients who visiting a day-and-night pharmacy, Babol, Iran.

This was a cross sectional study on 300 patients suffering from headache who visited a day-and-night pharmacy of Babol in 2008. For every patient two questionnaires were filled. The first questionnaire was about patient's demographic information and their opinions about the headache and the relevant drugs. The second questionnaire was a translated standard MIDAS questionnaire for headache severity assessment. This questionnaire is based on calculating the number of the days taking off work or having some restrictions during those working days during last 3 months and scored from 0 to 21 that divided into 4 groups of minimal disability (0-5), mild disability (6-10), moderate disability (11-20) and severe disability (above 21). The score was calculated for each question.

Hundred and seventy three patients (57.67%) were looking for over the counter (OTC) drugs and the rest 127 patients (42.33%) had visited physician and had prescriptions for their headache. The most common OTC drug requested by patients was ibuprofen (48.55%) and the most common drug among the prescribed drugs was dexamethasone (38.58%). Fifty (16.67%) patients had severe disability, 87 (29%) moderate, 117 (39%) mild and 46 (15.33%) patients had a minimal disability from headache.

Most patients who had prescriptions for their headaches had a higher MIDAS score (more disable) compared to OTC patients. Pharmacists play an important role in advising patients to visit a doctor and have prescription.