Cough Headache: Why Does My Head Hurts When I Cough

In today post, I am going to write about Why Does My Head Hurts When I Cough? and How I relieve this type of pain.

A cough headache is an unusual type of a headache that is caused by straining such as coughing, sneezing, laughing, crying, blowing your nose, or even when you are bending down. A cough headache can also be caused by a dry cough or a cough that has been around someone for weeks. When you are coughing or sneezing it will create a pressure on your head, chest, and neck and this pressure then create the headaches.

Types of Cough Headache

There are two types of cough headaches that are categorized by doctors. The first type is the primary cough headaches. This kind of headaches are still considered harmless and occurred in a limited episode. Over time, people with The headaches will recover by themselves without having to have special treatment. The second type is a secondary cough headache. Secondary cough Ones are considered more serious and dangerous because they may have something to do with some abnormalities in the patient’s brain, such as an early symptom of a brain tumor or distorted shape of the skull, or brain protruding along the base of the patient’s skull. Since the second cough headaches can be very serious its treatment may even require surgery.

Symptoms of Cough Headaches

The symptoms of primary and secondary headaches are somewhat different. The headaches begin very suddenly when you just did coughing, sneezing, or crying. The first type of a cough headache will also last for a few seconds or a few minutes, however, there are also cases where the headaches last for hours. A primary cough headache will cause a sharp, splitting, or stinging pain to your head and it also affects both sides of the head and a worse effect will be caused at the back of your head. Lastly, primary headaches are usually followed by a dull ache in your head that lasts for hours. Meanwhile, the secondary cough has the same symptoms as a primary headache but with a greater pain in the head. The pain of a secondary cough will usually be accompanied by fainting, dizziness, unsteadiness, and the headache will last more than just a couple of hours.

Causes of Cough Headaches

Up to this day, the main causes of the headaches are still unknown. However, people can experience the headaches as the result of increase suppression and straining inside the head caused by coughing, sneezing, laughing too hard or even caused by physical activities such as headstand. There are several causes for the coughing that can lead to primary cough headaches such as smoking, asthma, weather changes, or even allergies towards the smoke, pollen grains, or dust that can lead to a dry cough.

Meanwhile, the secondary cough can be caused by a weakness in one of the brain’s blood vessels or a brain aneurysm, a flaw in the shape of the patient’s skull, a brain tumor, a flaw in the cerebellum part of the brain, or even a spontaneous leak of the cerebrospinal fluid. Since a secondary cough can be the symptoms of many dangerous brain problems, people who experience secondary brain headaches should be brought to the hospital immediately.

Home Remedies to Treat a Dry Cough

In order to avoid primary cough headaches, you can start by treating your dry cough earlier. Treating dry cough can be done using chemical medicine or by home remedies. If you prefer more natural and traditional home remedies here are some recipes to cure a dry cough. The first remedy is by mixing lemon, salt, and black pepper. Suck a half cut lemon filled with salt and black pepper powder and your dry cough will disappear. Another effective home remedy for a dry cough is by mixing honey with white pepper powder. The anti-inflammation properties of honey will soothe your inflamed throat and the white pepper will reduce your coughing frequencies. Grapes and garlic are also said to be an effective cure for a dry cough and consuming them for several days will surely cure your dry cough naturally. Add one tablespoon of lemon juice and a medium sized of onion into a glass of boiled water for the instant cure of a dry cough. Add also honey to the mixture to give it more taste.

Treatment for Cough Headaches

The treatment you can take to cure cough headaches will be different depending on which a cough headache you have, primary or secondary headaches. For primary cough headaches, you have to consume doctor prescribed medicine to reduce the pain. If you have a history of cough headaches you may also ask your doctor to prescribe some preventive medicine for you to consume. Some of the doctor prescribed cough headaches treatments include indomethacin or indocin, which is an anti-inflammatory drug, propranolol or Innopran XL, which is a medication to relax blood vessels and reduce blood pressure, and acetazolamide or Diamox, a medication that can reduce the amount of spinal fluid and reduce the pressure inside the patient’s skull.

On the other hand, when you experience the symptoms of a secondary cough you should undergo some more examinations to make sure what cause the secondary headaches. Since secondary headaches are almost always caused by dangerous disease surgery is the only way to cure it. Preventive medication cannot be given to patients with a secondary cough since the headaches cannot be predicted and usually will not help at all.

Prevention of Cough Headaches

As I said before, it is difficult and downright impossible to prevent a secondary cough headache. However, there are certain ways to prevent the primary cough headaches. Since the primary cough headaches are caused by dry coughing or other kinds of straining towards your head you should avoid doing activities that will put too much strain on your head. If you have lung infections such as bronchitis, treat it immediately before the infection spreads. You should also get annual flu shots and also avoid taking any medications that will cause coughing as the side effect so that you can avoid asking “Why does my head hurts when I cough?”