Sleep and Headache Syndromes

Sleep quality and sleep duration affect pain thresholds in experimental models, and in clinical practice changes in sleep can cause or trigger headache. Obstructive sleep apnea is well documented to cause or trigger certain headache syndromes, in part because CPAP is available as a specific and effective treatment that improves headaches in patients who have both. Patients who have cluster headache have a high frequency of sleep apnea and there are reports of improvement in cluster after CPAP therapy, but no controlled trials. Behavior modification to improve sleep quality seems to improve chronic migraine. The authors appropriate screening for sleep disorders in patients who have headache and that sleep clinicians familiarize themselves with headache syndromes.