What are other reasons why a person might think their headache is a sinus headache?
It’s not uncommon for patients to say, “Sinus headaches run in my family.” But usually, we don’t think of infectious processes as having a genetic link. And for women who say, “It seems like I get sinus headaches and they’re worse around my menstrual cycle,” we think about migraine, not infections. If you look the patients with these self-described or previously clinician-diagnosed sinus headaches that turned out to be migraines, the triggers often included things such as weather changes, which can lead many sufferers to presume that the attack was sinus related. In fact, weather changes are a frequently encountered trigger for migraine headaches. Many headache sufferers notice headaches seem to be worse in the spring and the fall, during the time typical of seasonal allergies. This association also leads many to presume that their headaches are sinus related. What message can be taken from this study? I think the message here is not that every person with sinus headache has migraine.
