Psychological Assessment and Treatment of Chronic Benign Headache

Overview

Subjects with chronic migraine or tension headaches will receive 12 sessions of biofeedback or relaxation training after fulfilling screening, intake interviews, \& psychological testing requirements. They will chart headache pain, anger level, \& medication usage throughout baseline, treatment, and 3 month follow-up periods. Migraine sufferers will receive a combination of progressive muscle relaxation training and thermal biofeedback (learning to warm hands). Subjects are randomly assigned to receive treatment either in the office with the therapist or from another room (where communication will be over a computer). The research is designed to compare the effectiveness of treatment based on location. Tension headache sufferers will receive training in how to reduce their muscle tension levels. They will be randomly assigned to have equipment monitor muscle tension levels either in the forehead or shoulder regions. The research is designed to compare the effectiveness of feedback to the forehead versus the shoulder muscles.

Conditions