In people with migraine, ten sessions of transdiagnostic cognitive behavioral therapy reduced the intensity of migraine, and related depression, anxiety, and disability. These improvements persisted one month after the therapy ended.

This trial was carried out to assess the effectiveness of transdiagnostic cognitive behavioral therapy (TCBT) to treat migraine.

In this randomized clinical pilot trial, 40 people with migraine (20 to 50 years of age) were included. They were randomly segregated into two groups: (a) Intervention, which received ten sessions of TCBT, and (b) Control, which attended one session on stress-reduction and relaxation strategies.

Pre-intervention, post-intervention (3-month follow-up), and one month following TCBT completion (4-month follow-up) were used to measure the number of days with headache, the severity of headache, migraine-linked disability and its effects on daily life, the number of painkillers used for headaches, anxiety, and depression.

Notably, 35 migraine sufferers with moderate to severe attacks finished the research (19 and 16 in control and TCBT groups, respectively). Between study time points, TCBT improved all assessed items in the intervention group. But, this amelioration was not witnessed in the control group. At 3 and 4-month follow-ups, the between-group evaluations showed that the TCBT group outperformed the control group in majority of the estimated items.

TCBT appears to be an efficient, viable, practicable, and affordable intervention for migraine management.