Headache Health Services in Portugal – 2022: A Survey by the Portuguese Headache Society

Abstract

Introduction: Aiming to improve the medical care provided to patients with headaches in Portugal, the Portuguese Headache Society (SPC) transposed the European recommendations for the organization of health services for headache to the Portuguese context. This document calculates the need for resources, in terms of health services, to ensure effective and quality support for headache patients, both in terms of primary and specialized care, the latter being attributed to neurology. In this sense, it was considered necessary to survey he offer of differentiated health services for headaches in Portugal and its’ perspective of evolution, in the coming years, in order to understand if it corresponds to the estimated needs.
Methods: An online survey was made available to members of the SPC and the Portuguese Society of Neurology, which characterizes the provision of differentiated health services in headache.
Results: Responses were obtained from 52 doctors, of 40 health care facilities, 24 (59%) belonging to the national health system. The national territory was covered adequately, except in the regions of Alentejo and Algarve. Most centers have headache clinics, 88% with dedicated doctors and 91% with advanced treatment techniques (nerve blocks, botulinum toxin and monoclonal antibodies). Most of these centers have only 1 or 2 physicians assigned to this function, providing an average of 169 consultations per working day – each institution offers an average of 20 consultations per week. The waiting time for the consultation is over 3 months in 65% of the centers of the SNS, but the consultations and treatments allocated time is adequate and most have adequate technical resources. Most centers expect to increase their offer in the next 2 years.
Conclusion: Although with limitations conditioned by the method, we can state that there are an adequate number of centers for differentiated support of headaches patients in Portugal, although the services offer in lower than necessary (about 13%), conditioned mainly by scarcity of medical time assigned to this role.