What is a rebound headache?
Analgesics (pain killers) are designed to relieve pain, but if these drugs (both prescription and nonprescription) are overused, they can actually cause headaches. This is known as analgesic rebound headache (ARH) or “rebound headache.” It may occur when overusing certain drugs of the ergot family as well. Headache sufferers taking analgesic medications every day, or even as infrequently as two times a week, may find that they must take ever-increasing dosages to achieve relief. With continued overuse the medication becomes less and less effective, with pain-free periods between headaches becoming shorter and shorter. The result can be a self-sustaining cycle of increasing pain and medication. Advertisements which promote “quick cures” for headaches have added greatly to the frequency of rebound headache. Many individuals with headache awaken each morning and retire each night with pain. Sufferers have sought out various medical as well as non-medical avenues for help, ranging from qua
So you are a regular sufferer of headaches. To try and ease the pain you take medication which works so well you take it again as soon as the first signs of your next headache appear. Then you think to yourself that maybe taking more than the normal dose might be better for you. Then you find that the pills aren’t working as well as they used to so what do you do? Of course you take even more and before you realise it you are now in the cycle of headache-medication-headache that is known as a rebound headache. First of all it is important to note that rebound headaches (also called medication overuse headaches) are not a sub-category of normal headaches but a syndrome. They are a result of self-medication by people who suffer from frequent headaches (migraine etc.). They regularly use analgesics (any drug that is used to relieve pain) to try and get rid of the headache, this gives temporary relief so they take another pill and so on and so on. The result is a headache that is caused by
