Headaches, a virtually universal human complaint at one time or another, are among the top reasons for medical evacuation of military personnel from Iraq and Afghanistan, and for ongoing depletion of active-duty ranks in those countries, according to research led by Johns Hopkins specialists. Just one-third of soldiers sent home because of headaches return to duty in either place, the research shows.
“Everyone gets headaches, and there are generally physical or psychological stressors that contribute to them,” says study leader Steven P. Cohen, M.D., an associate professor of anesthesiology and critical care medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and a colonel in the U.S. Army Reserves. “War amplifies all stressors, which may be why headaches take such a great toll in soldiers overseas.”
The findings, published online in Cephalalgia, the journal of the International Headache Society, highlight one of the fastest-growing causes of medical evacuations from the two prolonged military conflicts. They are a significant and worrisome contributor to the depletion of military units overseas, Cohen says.
Overall, neurological illness is one of the top three causes of non-combat-related loss of unit strength in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom, and headaches are the most common neurological complaint in the war zones. Cohen and his team found that post-concussion headaches and migraines were the most common forms of headache requiring evacuation. Physical trauma led to almost half of the debilitating headaches, they determined.
Read more: http://www.newswise.com/articles/headaches-take-toll-on-soldiers
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