{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,30]],"date-time":"2026-05-30T00:00:32Z","timestamp":1780099232406,"version":"3.54.0"},"reference-count":26,"publisher":"Public Library of Science (PLoS)","issue":"11","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,18]],"date-time":"2022-11-18T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1668729600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["www.plosone.org"],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["PLoS ONE"],"abstract":"<jats:sec id=\"sec001\">\n<jats:title>Background<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>Headache is a common neurological disorder, with a global prevalence of around 50%. It may affect people of any age, gender, education, socioeconomic status and occupation. Tension headache, migraine headache and cluster headache are commonly encountered headache types. The prevalence of headache problems is higher among medical students. This could potentially affect their academic performance and quality of life. The objective of this study is to find out the prevalence of headaches and their clinical characteristics among students of a medical college.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec id=\"sec002\">\n<jats:title>Materials and methods<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>An online, single-centre, cross-sectional study was conducted among undergraduate medical students in Nepal. Stratified sampling followed by a simple random sampling technique was adopted depending upon the academic years of students. For data collection, pre-tested semi-structured questionnaire was used. The data entry and analysis were done by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (IBM-SPSS), version-23. The prevalence of headache and its subtypes were calculated. All the clinical characteristics associated with headaches were also studied.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec id=\"sec003\">\n<jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>The prevalence of headache disorder was 65 (26.86%), with tension headache (69.23%) being the commonest one. It was highest among fourth-year students (37.84%) followed by first-year students (33.33%). Anxiety\/stress (75.40%) was the most common precipitating factor. This problem stopped most of the students (63.09%) from doing daily activities. More than half of them (53.85%) practised self-medication in case of non-resolution of pain, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) were frequently used.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>\n<jats:sec id=\"sec004\">\n<jats:title>Conclusion<\/jats:title>\n<jats:p>Headache was fairly prevalent among medical students. Anxiety\/stress in medical life has led to headaches in the majority of students. The headache disturbed their daily activities and promoted self-medication practice. So, this problem should be properly looked into and addressed in time by the concerned authority.<\/jats:p>\n<\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1371\/journal.pone.0277821","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,18]],"date-time":"2022-11-18T18:24:12Z","timestamp":1668795852000},"page":"e0277821","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1371\/journal.pone.corrections_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":15,"title":["Prevalence and clinical characteristics of headache among medical students of Nepal: A cross-sectional study"],"prefix":"10.1371","volume":"17","author":[{"given":"Ayush Mohan","family":"Bhattarai","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Shekhar","family":"Gurung","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-0811-8316","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Bishnu Deep","family":"Pathak","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-7199-7213","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Saurab","family":"Karki","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Ayush","family":"Adhikari","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Om Prakash","family":"Tandon","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-1246-4569","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Sabin","family":"Poudel","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Deepak","family":"Yadav","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Chiranjibi","family":"Pant","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-9432-5233","authenticated-orcid":true,"given":"Bishal","family":"Dhakal","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"340","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2022,11,18]]},"reference":[{"key":"pone.0277821.ref001","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"285","DOI":"10.4103\/cmi.cmi_71_20","article-title":"Perceived cause and characteristics of headache among undergraduate medical students of Government Medical College, Srinagar: A cross-sectional study","volume":"18","author":"T Qazi","year":"2020","journal-title":"Curr Med Issues"},{"key":"pone.0277821.ref002","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1377","DOI":"10.5455\/njppp.2018.8.0620111062018","article-title":"Prevalence of migraine among medical students of a tertiary care teaching medical college and hospital in South India\u2014A cross-sectional study","volume":"8","author":"S Raju","year":"2018","journal-title":"Natl J Physiol Pharm Pharmacol"},{"key":"pone.0277821.ref003","volume-title":"Harrison\u2019s principles of internal medicine","author":"AS Fauci","year":"2015"},{"key":"pone.0277821.ref004","first-page":"5","article-title":"Headache Classification Committee of the International Headache Society (IHS)","volume":"38","author":"M. 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