1981 Volume 21 Issue 3 Pages 237-245
We detected 41 patients with muscle contraction headache, 12 with migraine and 26 with psychogenic headache and conducted some psychophysiological examinations in order to explore the differences in characteristics among these headaches. The definition of the diagnostic criteria of those headaches are ' the headache which continues more than a month unaccompanied with a few psychic symptoms and social maladaptation ' for the muscle contraction headache, ' the headache which is the chief complaint and comes from psychic problems such as anxiety, hypochondriasis and depression ' for the psychogenic headache, and ' attacks of headache of pulsating pain which comes at intervals with few symptoms ' for the migraine. The results of examinations are as follows. 1. For the psychological characteristics, Cornell Medical Index (CMI), Yatabe-Guilford Test (Y G) and Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) were applied. The result of CMI showed that most of the psychogenic headache patients and migraine patients were in the third and forth areas whereas the muscle contraction headache patients were not. The result of YG showed that the psychogenic headache patients had a tendency to be the E type, while the muscle contraction headache patients and the migraine patients showed a tendency tQ be the C type. The result of MMPI showed that muscle contraction headache patients and the psychogenic headache patients had high scores of 1,2 and 3 items, while the migraine patients showed the normal pattern. In addition, the psychogenic headache patients showed high scores of 7 and 8 items also. In summary it was found that psychogenic headache patients were neurotic whereas the muscle contraction headache and the migraine patients were not always so. 2. Polygraphic examination (EMG of frontalis muscle, plethysmograph of finger and superficial temporal artery, and microvibration(MV))was applied to 11 patients with muscle contraction headache, 6 patients with psychogenic headache, 4 patients with migraine and 9 controls. The muscle contraction headache patients have high EMG and low 'α%' of MV at the beginning, but lower EMG and higher 'α%' of MV after rest. After mirror drawing test (MDT), their EMGS become higher and 'α%' of MV lower. The psychogenic headache patients show the same pattern of MDT response as one of the muscle contraction headache patients but their EMG and MV at rest are similar to the control. Migraine patients show high EMG and low 'α%' of MV unrelated with MDT.
