This has been called “rebound” headache in the past. The perception, however, was that if you took medication, the next day’s headache was the rebound headache, and that’s all there was to it. More recent research has shown that it is not that simple. A pattern of frequent medication usage leads to an increase in the occurrence of headaches. This is sometimes called pharmacologically maintained headache, or analgesic abuse headache.

If you are a migraine sufferer, and you start having more frequent headaches as a consequence of using excessive medication, headaches may become less “migraine-like,” and may lose some of the usual migraine features, such as sensitivity to light and noise, or nausea, and the pain may become dull in character.

Present recommendations of the International Headache Society are not to take over-the-counter medications more than 15 days a month, and not to take prescription analgesics more than 9 days a month. Prescription analgesics that can cause medication overuse headache include triptan medications, ergot medications, opioids, and those containing butalbital. Over-the-counter medications most likely to cause medication overuse headache are those containing caffeine. Recent research suggests that triptans are more likely to cause increased headache frequency in men with frequent headaches than in women with frequent headaches.

A survey of family doctors found that this headache type was the third most common headache seen. Headache clinics in the US report that 30 to 80% of new patients seen have medication overuse headache.