Diphenhydramine as adjuvant therapy for acute migraine. An ED-based randomized clinical trial
Abstract
Background More than one million patients present to US emergency departments (ED) annually seeking care for acute migraine. Parenteral anti-histamines have long been used in combination with anti-dopaminergics such as metoclopramide to treat acute migraine in the ED. High quality data supporting this practice do not exist. We determined whether administration of diphenhydramine 50mg IV + metoclopramide 10mg IV resulted in greater rates of sustained headache relief than placebo+ metoclopramide 10mg IV. Methods This was a randomized, double-blind clinical trial comparing two active treatments for acute migraine in an ED. Eligible patients were adults younger than 65 years presenting with an acute moderate or severe headache meeting International Classification of Headache Disorders-2 migraine criteria. Patients were stratified based on presence or absence of allergic symptoms. The primary outcome was sustained headache relief, defined as achieving a headache level of mild or none within two hours of medication administration, and maintaining this level of relief without use of any additional headache medication for 48 hours. Secondary efficacy outcomes include mean improvement on a 0 to 10 verbal scale between baseline and one hour, the frequency with which subjects indicated they would want the same medication the next time they present to the ED with migraine, and the ED throughput time. Sample size calculation using a 2-sided alpha of 0.05, a beta of 0.20 and a 15%…
How strong is the evidence?
Evidence Hub reads this as a randomized trial, done in people. Its evidence level is 2 of 5 (High · randomized trial). Randomized trials of a reasonable size are the strongest single-study design. Reported size: 420 participants or records.
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