ICHD-3 Criteria (Medication-Overuse Headache)
Applies the ICHD-3 criteria for medication-overuse headache.
Open the calculator → Runs in your browser. Data leaves only if you deliberately send a problem report from the interactive tool.
Example
- Headache days per month
- 20
- Months of regular overuse
- 6
- Triptan days per month
- 12
- No better ICHD-3 explanation
- Yes
Result: ICHD-3 criteria for medication-overuse headache met
The tool opens with these values already filled in. Replace them with your own.
What the result means
- A
- Headache on 15 or more days a month in a patient with a pre-existing headache disorder.
- B
- Regular overuse for more than 3 months of one or more acute or symptomatic headache drugs.
- C
- Not better accounted for by another ICHD-3 diagnosis.
- 10 days
- 8.2.1 ergotamine, 8.2.2 triptans, 8.2.4 opioids and 8.2.5 combination analgesics count as overuse at 10 or more days a month.
- 15 days
- 8.2.3 simple analgesics - acetaminophen, aspirin, other NSAIDs - need 15 or more. Ibuprofen on 12 days a month is NOT overuse; a triptan on 12 days is.
- 8.2.6
- Any combination of ergotamine, triptans, non-opioid analgesics or opioids on 10 or more TOTAL days a month, with no single class overused, is still medication-overuse headache.
- Days, not doses
- That total counts days. Adding up the per-drug counts double-counts any day two drugs were taken, so enter the total separately.
What you enter
- Headache days per month
- Months of regular overuse
- Triptan days per month
- Ergotamine days per month
- Opioid days per month
- Combination analgesic days per month
- Acetaminophen days per month
- Aspirin or NSAID days per month
The other 2 fields
- Total acute medication days per month
- No better ICHD-3 explanation
How this is calculated
Headache Classification Committee of the International Headache Society (IHS). The International Classification of Headache Disorders, 3rd edition. Cephalalgia. 2018;38(1):1-211, section 8.2 and its subsections. Read the source ↗
A reference and educational tool. Not medical, legal, or financial advice, and not a substitute for clinician judgment.