Headache
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Headaches occur commonly in all patients, including those who have brain tumors. Using the search terms "headache and brain tumors," "intracranial neoplasms and headache," "facial pain and brain tumors," "brain neoplasms/pathology," and "headache/etiology," we reviewed the literature from the past 78 years on the proposed mechanisms of brain tumor headache, beginning with the work of Penfield. ⋯ There is an increasing overlap between the primary and secondary headaches and they may actually share a similar biological mechanism. While there can be some criticism that the experimental work with dural and arterial stimulation produced head pain and not actual headache, when considered with the clinical observations about headache type, coupled with improvement after treatment of the primary tumor, we believe that traction on these structures, coupled with increased intracranial pressure, is clearly part of the genesis of brain tumor headache and may also involve peripheral sensitization with neurogenic inflammation as well as a component of central sensitization through trigeminovascular afferents on the meninges and cranial vessels.
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Headaches occur commonly in all patients, including those who have brain tumors. It has been argued that there is a classic "brain tumor headache type" - defined by the International Headache Society as one that is localized, progressive, worse in the morning, aggravated by coughing or bending forward, develops in temporal and often spatial relation to the neoplasm, and resolves within 7 days of surgical removal or treatment with corticosteroids. ⋯ Our literature review revealed that brain tumor headache uncommonly presents with classic brain tumor headache characteristics and often satisfies criteria for a primary headache category such as migraine or tension-type. Thus, clinicians may miss headaches due to brain tumors in following ICHD-3 criteria, and the distinction between primary and secondary headache disorders may not be so clear-cut.