Acute treatment of infantile headache

Introduction. There are few studies in children, as compared with adults, of the different therapeutic options which may be useful to treat acute episodes of headache. There is a degree of anarchy in the use of analgesics for this common problem. Development. Bearing in mind that headache is usually chronic, generally occurring as acute episodes, it is necessary to follow rules based on maximum efficacy and a minimum of problems due to side-effects or habituation. We suggest guidelines for the treatment of episodes of headache, initially with drugs commonly used in childhood. The first choice is: ibuprofen, naproxene, paracetamol or aspirin. Any of these may be associated with metoclopramide to increase the effect and spectrum of treatment. Our second choice is nasal sumatryptan.