Relationship between MIDAS, depression, anxiety and alexithymia in migraine patients

The co-existence of psychiatric comorbidities with migraine is well known; however, the relationship between alexithymia and migraine has not been persuasively shown yet. The aim of the study was to assess the relationships between migraine-related disability, depression, anxiety and alexithymia. One hundred and forty-five migraine patients (33.18 +/- 8.6; 111 females, 34 males), and 50 control subjects (29.06 +/- 7.6; 34 females, 16 males) were prospectively enrolled for the study. The participants completed a demographic data form and Migraine Disability Assessment Scale, Beck Depression Inventory, Beck Anxiety Inventory and Toronto Alexithymia Score-20 (TAS-20). All migraine patients were more depressive (p = 0.01) and anxious (p = 0.001) than the healthy subjects. TAS-20 scores of the migraine sufferers and the control group did not indicate alexithymia. The migraine-related disability of all migraine patients was severe (27.84 +/- 29.22). Depression and anxiety scores in the migraine patients were highly correlated with each other and TAS-20 (r = 0.485,p = 0.001) and all its subscales in turn: difficulty in identifying (r = 0.435,p < 0.001) and describing feelings (r = 0.451,p = 0.001) and externally oriented thinking (r = 0.302,p = 0.001). Moreover, logistic regression analysis revealed that depression and anxiety predicted alexithymia. Our findings showed a complex relationship between migraine, depression, anxiety and alexithymia. On the other hand, alexithymia apparently was not directly connected to migraine, but its presence could be predicted in migraine patients because of co-morbid depression and anxiety.