539: Role of Pulsed Radio frequency of Occipital Nerves in managing Chronic Headache - Case Series

Topic: Clinical Science
Subtopic: Pain category (ICD-11), Chronic secondary headache, Non-pharmacological treatments, Treatment/management

Background and Aims: Occipital headache is a common but neglected entity in diagnosis & management of chronic headaches. Most patients have severe pain in occipital area sometimes associated with neck pain & unilateral headache with sharp radiation towards frontal area & associated with tingling & heaviness.
Most patients do well with medical management & good rehabilitation. But some tend to get severe pain over the years. Pulsed Radiofrequency of Greater & Lesser occipital Nerves serves as good Innovative therapy giving long term pain relief for such kind of patients without dependence on medication & with lesser side effects.

Methods: Case series consists of 63 cases with exclusion of other primary headaches such as Tension, cluster , Migraine & other headaches . Age criteria was between 35 to 60 years both male and female patients with female patients outnumbered as 39 patients & male patients 24 in number. Patients with comorbidity like Hypertension, Diabetes & any other neurological condition were excluded.
Pulsed Radiofrequency ablation done at 42 degree for 8 mins each from Greater & Lesser occipital nerves done unilaterally for each patient.
VAS pain score scale given to each patient in follow up for 6 months period on monthly assessment.

Results: Out of 63 patients done - 4 patients lost follow-up & were excluded from the studies.
Out of 59 patients - 37 were females & 22 were males who had regular follow up for 6 months period.
Findings are as follows-
a) For First 4 months VAS Score Reduced from average 8/10 to 2/10 in most of the patients
b) Numbness & heaviness was experienced by 21 patients on occipital region in initial few days which later disappeared.
c) in last 2 months around 7 patients had occasion flare up but settled with Rescue analgesic Naprosyn 500 mg .

Conclusions: Pulsed Radiofrequency is Innovative therapy giving long term pain relief in patients with chronic occipital headache non responding to routine medication & treatments without major side effects & without major flare ups giving good quality of life to patients with chronic headaches.
Pulsed Radiofrequency reduces the pill burden & has cost effectiveness efficiency.

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Presenting Author: Dr.Vishal Gunjal
Submitting Author: Vishal Gunjal

Senior Author: Dr. Vishal Gunjal

IASP 2026 Global Year theme of Neuropathic Pain: Yes