Background In different clinical studies, the use of botulinum toxin has shown a reduction in health spending, reducing the number of drugs used for patients and decreasing the number of doctor visits and the frequency of episodes.

Purpose To analyse the demographic characteristics of the population diagnosed with chronic migraine and treated with botulinum toxin, to make a database for a future study.

Material and methods This was a retrospective observational study. The neurology department reported on all patients who had been administered botulinum toxin for chronic migraine. We created a database, where the mid-point was the first administration of toxin; we registered data 1 year before and 1 year after the first administration of toxin. The variables studied were patient age, sex, obesity, toxic habits, hypertension, primary physician visits, specialist visits, emergency visits and frequency of migraine attacks.

Results 26 patients were included in the study. Mean age of the patients was 49 years, 3 men and 23 women. 2 patients were obese, 2 had toxic habits and 7 patients had hypertension. In the year previous to the first administration, average family doctor visits was 1.69, average visits to the neurologist was 2.46 with 1.15 emergency visits for migraine headaches. The average number of drugs prescribed per patient was 10, 3 from the family of triptans. The average expenditure on healthcare was €386 and on medicines was €602. The frequency of migraine episodes that year was daily.

Conclusion The demographic characteristics of the patients in our study were similar to other published studies: 88% were women compared with 12% of men. With reference to the risk factors studied, 7% were obese, 7% had toxic habits and 26% had high blood pressure. Once the results from the previous year are analysed, we will use the same protocol for the year after the first administration of toxin, with the goal of comparing the data and checking the reduction in expenditure that botulinum toxin has shown in published studies.

References and/or acknowledgements Lainez-Andres JM. Onabotulinumtoxin en el tratamiento de la migrana crónica. Rev Neurol2012;54(Suppl 2): S39–50.

Patricia Pozo-Rosic. Migraña crónica: Epidemiología e Impacto. Rev Neurol 2012;54(Suppl 2):S3–11.

No conflict of interest