Abstract Details

Migraine is a leading cause of disability in the United States, a highly stigmatized disorder, and remains a common reason for patients to seek emergency department care. Patients who present to the ED for acute migraine treatment often have lower socioeconomic status, and are less likely to access specialized migraine care and treatment. While there has been progress in treatments over the last decade, patients with chronic migraine often report dissatisfaction with treatment in the emergency department.

Evaluating the clinical and social impact of migraine in the emergency department is important from a public health disparity standpoint. Patients who use an emergency department (ED) for acute migraine attacks have higher migraine disability scores and lower socioeconomic status. We examine if a multimodal migraine intervention improves patient follow up rates in Neurology clinics for improved prevention.

This is a prospective observational study to assess patients who present to the ED for headache. We have partnered with Thomas Jefferson University Hospital's ED to evaluate patient follow up rates with and without intervention. The intervention is the distribution of standardized migraine triage kits. We secured 100 migraine triage kits, which contain adjunctive non-pharmaceutical treatment modalities for migraine symptoms. We are tracking which patients in our ED received triage kits. We are tracking which patients are provided with this intervention, and studying whether or not these patients pursued post discharge follow up with our Neurology department compared to control.

30 migraine patients were tracked with and without the triage bag intervention. Significant improvement in follow up occurred in the group receiving intervention.

Our intervention is improving outpatient follow up post discharge from the emergency department in patients most at risk of being lost to follow up.