Headaches are relatively common in children and adolescents. The prevalence of severe recurrent headaches in those under the age of 10 is almost 10 per 1,000 and the number increases as the child gets older. Headaches cause missed school days, limit participation in social activities, family events, and school activities.
Children’s headaches exhibit no gender variation before puberty. In late adolescence, however, twice as many females report recurrent headaches.
When a child has a recurrent headache, certain causes are more likely than others. As a parent you have a choice. Pain medication may alleviate some of the discomfort but they only cover the symptom and do nothing to address the underlying cause of the headache.

Treating pain can be dangerous

Most nonprescription products have warnings against use in younger children. Acetaminophen can cause serious side effects. Aspirin is no longer a good choice for headache in children of any age, due to the possibility of Reye’s syndrome (may cause death). Naproxen sodium (Aleve) is not to be given to anyone under the age of 12, and ketoprofen is not to be given to anyone under the age of 16. Even, ibuprofen can cause kidney damage in both children and adults. No product is indicated for children under the age of 6 months.

Adults also experience pain medication side-effects. Best estimates of hospitalization and death amongst these patients from gastrointestinal ulcers caused by these medications are 40,000 per million (4 %) and 4,000 per million (.4%) respectively. In the US this amounts to 32,000 hospitalizations per annum, 3,200 deaths. Surgery carries even greater risk. Serious complications from cervical spine surgery for neck pain are 15,600 cases of paralysis or stroke per million, and the mortality rate is 6,900 per million.
Recently, a long-term outcome study of headaches in childhood was completed using 11,407 participants. This is the first study on the topic using prospectively collected population based data, which confirms that children with headaches do not simply “grow out” of their complaint and may also “grow into” others.
Waiting for your child to out grow headaches is not in their best interest. Chiropractic is a viable option.

The chiropractic approach

One of the most common causes of headaches is a condition that chiropractic adjustments help to correct. The condition is called Subluxation. Correcting restricted movement of cervical facet joints, and thereby influencing associated spinal reflexes, nerves and muscle tension, is a principal target of chiropractic care. Recent evidence from Duke University concluded that cervicogenic headaches (CGH), one of the common forms of headaches, was effectively treated with spinal adjustments. Chiropractic adjustments also resulted in more sustained benefit, in terms of both headache frequency and intensity, than amitriptyline medication with Tension-type (TTH) headaches.