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Stress and Somatic Symptoms pp 207–216Cite as

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Patients with Chronic Headache

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Abstract

Numerous studies have demonstrated migraine and/or tension headache comorbid with depression and/or anxiety. Cognitive behavioral treatment (CBT) has been found to be an efficacious treatment for migraine and tension headache. The goal of CBT is to alter symptom-related physiological activity indirectly by changing the way clients cope with headache-eliciting stressors. This treatment focuses directly on their cognitive and behavioral changes. CBT can be divided into education, self-monitoring, and problem-solving or coping skills training. The therapeutic processes in two cases with chronic headache were presented, demonstrating their cognitive distortions and maladaptive assumptions. Psychological tools such as sentence completion test (SCT) can be used as a method to discover cognitive distortions instead of self-assessments. The existing literature suggests that cognitive therapy may be more effective in maintaining long-term treatment effect as well as reducing headaches than biofeedback treatment in patients with chronic headache.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry, Yonsei University College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea

    Kyung Bong Koh

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  1. Kyung Bong Koh
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Koh, K.B. (2018). Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Patients with Chronic Headache. In: Stress and Somatic Symptoms. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02783-4_18

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