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Can exercise induce headache?

If you experience a shooting pain soon after exercising, it's time to go see a doctor

Exercise gives some people a headache. Sounds like an excuse a lazy person might give to avoid exercise, but it is a fact. And an exercise-induced headache does not necessarily mean you have migraine. People without migraine are just as likely to develop headache on exertion as those with it.

Migraine problem

Effort migraine and exertion-induced headache are the two most common causes of headache after exercise. The former is usually preceded by symptoms like blurred vision and flashing lights. The headache usually lasts for a few hours, and most people can tell that they have a migraine coming on before it is full blown.

Exercising in hot weather can induce a headache in migraine sufferers. A strict adherence to prescribed drug therapy can minimise the frequency and duration of attacks. But once an attack starts, there is little you can do but sleep in a dark and quiet room.

Exercise-induced headache was first described in the 1930s. It affects around one per cent of the population. The headache begins as a throbbing sensation in the back of the head and lasts for a few hours. It recedes with analgesics.

Problems with the cervical spine can also cause a kind of headache associated with blurred vision. If moving the neck brings on a headache, it may be time to consult a doctor.

Nausea

Not all exercise-linked headaches are benign. Some are deadly serious. If your headache lasts for more than a few hours, if its onset feels like a thunderclap, and if nausea or vomiting too occurs, the headache is unlikely to be benign.

A headache that increases over several days, a history of head injury, unilateral headache, a change in the usual pattern of headache in effort migraine or exertion-induced headache, symptoms in the rest of the body and weakness in the limbs are all indicators that the headache may have a serious underlying cause. Consult a doctor if you experience any of these problems.

RAJIV M

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