Did you know that children suffer too?

In children with migraine, recurrent absenteeism with serious consequences for learning and socialization can, among other things, lead to them dropping out of school or even refusing higher education.

However, the harmful effects of this common neurological disease on children and their future are largely unknown. Finally, the problem of migraine is poorly understood, and teachers and administrators, including school nurses, often find themselves helpless.

This is why the association La Voix des Migraineux is launching a campaign to raise awareness about the education of children with migraine in school and recalls the existence of a legal system: the PAI (Project for Individual Admission) proposed by the National Education. This makes it possible to better organize the child’s life in the institution, specifying his therapeutic needs.

8% of children actually suffer from migraines

The World Health Organization recognizes migraine as the second most disabling disease in the world. While it is finally starting to be seen as a disease in its own right when it affects adults (it is mainly expressed between the ages of 20 and 50), children are often forgotten, although they suffer from it too, sometimes from a very young age .

The study estimates the prevalence of migraine among French children and adolescents to be 8%. Another study estimates that worldwide the rate is 9% among girls and 7% among boys.

Symptoms different from those in adults.

The complex mechanisms of migraine are not fully understood. The brains of migraine sufferers appear to be hypersensitive to stimuli that are harmless to non-migraine sufferers.

” The brain genetically determined as a migraine is the brain – namely the hypothalamus, which is the generator of attacks – very sensitive to changes (sleep, food intake, emotions, pace of life, different activities, etc.), adds Professor Anne Donnett , a neurologist from the clinic. Center for the Assessment and Treatment of Pain (Marseille University Hospital), especially hormonal changes. »

The pitfall is that migraines in children present with symptoms that are sometimes different from those in adults, such as pallor, often preceded by abdominal pain, headaches, often severe, phonophobia (sound is intolerable), photophobia (including light) and aura. 30% of cases (blurred vision, flickering, tingling, speech difficulties, weakness, numbness, etc.).

Another difference is that the average duration of a migraine attack in children is usually shorter than in adults (on average 2 hours compared to 4 hours), and the pain is more likely to be bilateral, affecting both temples or both parts of the front at the same time.

According to the Chronic Pain Center at the Timonet Hospital in Marseille, every second child with migraine experiences more than one attack per month, with 78% experiencing attacks of moderate to fairly severe intensity.

In addition, more than 40% experience nausea or vomiting during attacks, and more than a third experience abdominal pain.

The famous “liver crisis” is actually a migraine.

According to the French Society for the Study of Migraine and Headaches, children may also experience clinical pictures that do not lead to headaches, but in the form of other symptoms that also develop into attacks: recurrent benign dizziness, recurring abdominal pain (“abdominal migraine” ). , cyclic vomiting, etc.

For all of these forms of “migraine without headache”, a diagnosis of migraine will only be made when other causes of these symptoms have been eliminated. What we used to call “liver attacks” or “acetone attacks” are now considered true migraine attacks.

Migraine is more than just a headache

La Voix des Migraineurs, which receives numerous testimonies from parents of children suffering from migraine, is campaigning for the creation and approval of a migraine-specific personal intake (PAI) project. This migraine-type PAI will include actions to be taken in the event of a crisis (crisis treatment prescribed, behavior to be adopted, such as isolating the child in a calm and bright place and giving him something to drink, etc. ). .) and will make the necessary adjustments to limit provoking factors in school and extracurricular environments (canteen, kindergarten, study)