This association appears to exist only for migraine with aura.
Researchers
used data from a large prospective U.S. cohort study of 27,840
healthy women (age
45) to clarify the
relation between migraine, with or without aura, and cardiovascular
and cerebrovascular disease. Of the 3610 women (13%) with active
migraine at baseline (i.e., within the previous year), 1434 (40%)
reported experiencing migraine with aura.
During a mean follow-up of 10 years, 251 ischemic strokes, 249 myocardial infarctions, 130 deaths from ischemic cardiovascular disease, 514 coronary revascularizations, and 408 cases of new-onset angina were reported. In multivariate analyses adjusted for age and several cardiovascular risk factors, no association was found between any of these outcomes and active migraine without aura, but significant associations were noted between all outcomes and active migraine with aura; hazard ratios ranged from 1.71 to 2.33.
Comment: Many patients (and physicians, for that matter) use the label "migraine" loosely to describe many types of headache, but associations with a broad range of cardiovascular disease outcomes pertain only to migraine with aura. Patients who have migraine with aura might have risk factors for atherosclerosis that were not fully accounted for in this study. Editorialists note that a genetic polymorphism that causes a moderately increased level of homocysteine is more common than usual in patients with migraine with aura, but not in those without aura.
— Thomas L. Schwenk, MD
Published in Journal Watch August 22, 2006
Citation(s):
Kurth T et al. Migraine and risk of cardiovascular disease in women. JAMA 2006 Jul 19; 296:283-91.