Relationship between personality disorders and headaches using personality inventory disorders for DSM-5

Background: Studies on the specificity of migraine headache in patients with personality disorders are multiple. Results are often contradictory, which may be explained by psychological, socio-cultural, economic and purely individual differences of subjects.

Material and methods: 128 patients from the Department of Headache and Autonomic Disorders of the Institute of Neurology and Neurosurgery (Chisinau, the Republic of Moldova) were evaluated in this study, in 2 stages: psychometric testing using Personality Inventory Disorders (PID-5) for DSM-5 in the 1st stage and data collection, headache intensity assessment and Headache Questionnaire in the 2nd stage.

Results: The results of psychometric test allowed to separate the examined subjects into 3 groups according to numeric values of facets of PID-5: group I – Normal (0-1), group II – Accentuated Personality (1 – 1.66), group III – Personality Disorder (>1.66), and these results were correlated with intensity and frequency of headache. The analysis of 25 facets of PID-5, which are included in 5 domains of higher order: Negative Affection, Antagonism, Disinhibition, Detachment and Psychoticism, divided the domains into 3 groups: Internalization, Externalization and Psychoticism. These values were correlated again with intensity and frequency of headache.

Conclusions: Female gender has a higher introversion tendency than males, introversion and neurosis is more common among women with migraine; the onset of personality disorders occurs during early youth.