Many times after a car accident people will have initial neck pain, are seen in the emergency room and treated. If the injuries are not life threatening they are sent home with some medication and told to rest. Unfortunately, many will start to have headaches, even if they have never had headaches before. Those with a history of headaches will find their headaches are getting worse.
Most of the time the headache will dissipate over a week or two and everything will be fine.
But what if the headaches don’t go away? What happens and what do people do if the headache gets worse? Post traumatic headaches that get better in four to six weeks are considered acute headaches, but those that stay at the same pain level, start to get worse, or go beyond six weeks are more concerning. The headaches may be all over the head and moderate in pain with breakthrough stabbing, throbbing pain on one side. This more severe form of headache is associated with migraine symptoms and indeed is a migraine.
The key to post traumatic headache syndrome is to find a headache specialist and be patient. If the headaches are severe, chances are that it will take several months for any one treatment to have an effect. Most people are not aware of this fact in headache treatment, so they tend to start and stop treatments after a few days or weeks and become discouraged. The longer the brain has the treatments on board, the greater the chance it will heal.
Contact a San Jose Headache Relief Chiropractor today at 408.295.5559 or EMAIL US NOW