Premonitory and Accompanying Symptoms in Childhood Migraine

To review the literature on the clinical characteristics of the symptoms other than headache that occurs during a migraine attack in childhood and adolescence.

Premonitory symptoms (42-67%) and postdrome phase (82%) are frequent. The most frequent auras were visual. There was no association between age or sex and the occurrence of auras. Cranial autonomic symptoms are also frequent (40-70%) and are most often bilateral. Most studies suggest that age is not associated with the frequency of nausea, vomiting, photophobia, and phonophobia. Cephalic cutaneous allodynia (15-37%) and osmophobia (20-53%) are common symptoms in children with migraine. Osmophobia has low sensitivity and high specificity for the diagnosis of migraine and is associated with the severity of the migraine. Migraine is a complex disease, and although headache is its best-known symptom, other symptoms also occur frequently during migraine attacks in children and adolescents.