Do you take pain medication more than 2 or 3 days a week?

Medication-overuse headaches occur from overuse of pain relieving medications for headaches for at least three months. They develop at least 15 days out of the month, and often occur along with chronic daily headaches. Taking pain medication several times per month can increase the risk of developing medication-overuse headaches.

Sometimes called rebound headaches, medication-overuse headaches:

• Feel dull, achy, throbbing or pounding
• May awaken you early in the morning and persist all day
• May be most painful when medication first wears off
• Occur daily or nearly daily
• Sometimes cause nausea, trouble concentrating or irritability

Treatment

Typical treatment involves discontinuing the medications that cause these headaches. Sometimes medications need to be tapered off, and sometimes they are stopped altogether.

You may need preventive medications or other treatments, called bridge therapy, to help control pain as you stop taking the medications that caused your medication-overuse headaches. Your doctor can help you come up with the best plan.