How common are migraines in children and teenagers?
Most of the good data we have about the prevalence of migraine in children comes from studies in Scandinavian countries, especially Denmark. The figures that come out of those prospective studies suggest that up to 3 percent of children 3 to 7 years of age have migraine. And up to 11 percent of 7- to 11-year-olds have migraine. Between 11 and 15 years on up, migraine affects over 8 percent of children. During adolescence it becomes more frequent in girls than in boys.
What is a migraine?
There has to be at least five attacks that fulfill certain criteria. The criteria are headaches lasting anywhere from four to 72 hours that have at least two of the following characteristics: Being located on one side of the head, having a pulsing quality, being moderately or severely painful in intensity, and being aggravated by physical activity so that all the patient wants to do is to lie down. During the headache, the patient often has either nausea and/or vomiting and is sensitive to light and sound. And the headache mustn't be attributable to some other underlying disorder.
What are the different types of migraine?
Migraine is divided into different subsets, several of which are more frequent in children than others. Migraine with and without aura are more common in children. The aura is often visual in nature, so that the patient sees flashing, flickering light in the visual field. There are often pins and needles around the mouth or sometimes in one hand or elsewhere.
There is also a group of symptoms that actually aren't associated with a headache. These syndromes—called childhood periodic syndromes—can evolve into more typical migraine around puberty.
