Neurology Primer: DDX of Head Pain
Presented by: Dr. Adam Harcourt
To help those patients suffering from head pain, you first need to arrive at the correct differential diagnosis. You need to be able to recognize normal physiology and distinguish this from the condition’s pathophysiology. Then you can advance with confidence about how to help your patient.
This course will focus on the ability to properly diagnosis various headache and facial pain disorders. We will explore both the ICHD-3 criteria as well as more recent physical examination techniques and validated outcome measures to help clinicians better manage their headache patents. Each topic will include the differential diagnosis criteria of the condition, any validated examination techniques, and validated outcome measures. If appropriate for the topic, there will also be best practice guidelines for management for each of the primary headache disorder topics.
Headaches are the second leading cause of disability in the world for those under 50. Being able to properly diagnose what type of headache or facial pain a person is having is critical to getting them the care that they need. Treating a migraine as a tension headache or a medication overuse headache as a cluster headache will produce lackluster results and ultimately leave the patients to continue suffering.
The most common forms of headaches are known as primary headaches, such as migraine or tension headache, are the most common to present to practitioners of any type of manual therapy. This course will focus on the proper differentiation between all of the primary headaches, in addition to the latest objective testing and screening methods. This will ensure that you not only obtain the correct diagnoses, but that you are making progress with the condition so it can be managed appropriately.
We will also be covering secondary headache disorders such as cervicogenic headache, post-traumatic headaches, and many others. The goal of this course is to be confident in the diagnosis of many different headache-related disorders, while having diagnostic and treatment tools for the most common headache conditions you are likely to encounter in your practice.
Topics Covered
- Migraine and its variants
- Tension-Type Headache
- Cervicogenic Headaches
- Trigeminal Autonomic Cephalgias
- Other Primary Headache Disorders
- Headaches attributed to Trauma or Injury of the head/neck
- Summary of all other secondary headache disorders
- Neuropathies & Facial pains
- guidelines for the management of these conditions