Background

Migraine, a common chronic-intermittent disorder among reproductive age women, has emerged as a novel risk factor for adverse perinatal outcomes. Diagnostic reliability of self-report of physician-diagnosed migraine has not been investigated in pregnancy cohort studies. We investigated agreement of self-report of physician-diagnosed migraine with the diagnostic criteria promoted by the International Classification of Headache Disorders, 2nd edition (ICHD-II).

Methods

The cross-sectional study was conducted among 500 women who provided information on a detailed migraine questionnaire that allowed us to apply all ICHD-II diagnostic criteria.

Results

Approximately 92% of women reporting a diagnosis of migraine had the diagnosis between the ages of 11 and 40 years (<10 years 6.8%; 11–20 years 38.8%; 21–30 years 42.7%; 31–40 years 10.7%; and >40 years 1.0%). We confirmed self-reported migraine in 81.6% of women when applying the ICHD-II criteria for definitive migraine (63.1%) and probable migraine (18.5%).

Conclusion

There is good agreement between self-reported migraine and ICHD-II-based migraine classification in this pregnancy cohort. We demonstrate the feasibility of using questionnaire-based migraine assessment according to full ICHD-II criteria in epidemiological studies of pregnant women.