Impact of dissociative experiences in migraine and its close relationship with osmophobia

Migraine is a complex episodic disease manifested by dysfunction of the sympathetic nervous system along with numerous neuropsychiatric symptoms. The aim of this study was to identify the dissociative symptoms with neurobiological similarities in episodic and chronic migraine patients and to evaluate their correlation with migraine frequency and severity of attacks.

The study included 61 episodic, 45 chronic migraine patients diagnosed using the criteria of the International Headache Society and 54 healthy control subjects. Dissociative Experiences Scale, Beck Anxiety Scale and Beck Depression Inventory were filled with the interviews. Demographic, clinical and headache characteristics of the patients were recorded according to migraine types. Results were analyzed by Kruskal-Wallis method and Spearman's correlation tests.

Dissociative symptoms were more common in the patients with chronic migraine, and there was a statistically significant difference between the chronic migraine group and the episodic migraine and control groups (p = 0.001, p < 0.001). Dissociative experiences were correlated with depression and anxiety findings, and in both groups, there was a significant correlation between clinical characteristics of migraine and osmophobia in the controlled partial correlation analysis (p < 0.05).

This study revealed that dissociative symptoms are more common especially in patients with chronic migraine and there is a significant association with osmophobia in both migraine groups. According to these data, we think that dissociative symptoms in chronic migraine patients will be questioned and osmophobia may be a guide in this regard.