Association of migraine aura with patent foramen ovale and atrial septal aneurysms

Abstract

The relationship between migrainous aura and patent foramen ovale (PFO) remains uncertain We performed 'bubble' contrast transthoracic echocardiography on 80 migraineurs with 4-15 headache days per calendar month, mean age 45 (75% female) with mean 9.4 headache days. A large PFO was defined by passage of an uncountable bolus of bubbles or complete opacification of the left-heart in ≤3 cycles, while a moderate PFO was defined by passage of ≥20 bubbles but not sufficient to form a bolus or opacify the whole of the left heart. There was a moderate or large PFO in 28 (35%; 95% CI 24-46%). There were atrial septal aneurysms in 11 (15%) and the relationship with PFO was moderately strong (spearman rank correlation 0.493, CI 0.308 to 0.643; p < 0.0001). Seven (9%) had a valve abnormality and one had a closure device for an atrial septal defect. Aura were reported in 31 (39%) and in these the PFO was large in 9 (29%) compared with 8 (16%; p = 0.143) without aura. There was no relationship between the size of the PFO and the number of headache days (difference between no PFO and large PFO = -0.6 days; 95% CI -2.6 to +1.4; p-value for any difference between groups = 0.316). The prevalence of moderate or large patent foramen ovale was 35% and was not associated with the presence of aura or the frequency of the headache.