Chapter 2 - Headache in children

Abstract

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses some of the more common or more serious causes of headache in childhood. Although investigation by questionnaire is inaccurate, all studies of headache prevalence in children agree in finding it high. Headache is an accompaniment of fever of any cause. Drowsiness, irritability, and photophobia can occur in any child with fever. In subacute and chronic meningitis, headache is more insidious. In younger children with head injury, trauma may not be remembered and this is the case at any age when there is retrograde amnesia. Every child should have a skull X-ray, and his condition should be reassessed after an interval. The nature of the headache is less important as a guide to investigation than associated symptoms and signs and, most important, the general well-being of the child.