Headache after a motor vehicle collision can have multiple contributors. The evaluation should distinguish post-traumatic headache from cervical or occipital pain generators and identify symptoms that warrant neurologic or emergency assessment.
Symptoms after a collision can overlap. Their presence does not by itself establish a specific diagnosis; the complete pattern helps guide the evaluation.
Headache beginning or worsening after the collision
Pain arising from the upper neck or occipital region
Light or sound sensitivity, nausea, or dizziness
Neck pain accompanying headache
Reduced concentration, sleep disruption, or activity tolerance
Headache after trauma should not automatically be attributed to the cervical spine. The history includes timing, headache phenotype, associated neurologic symptoms, cervical and occipital findings, prior headache history, and available records or imaging. Red-flag features may require emergency, neurologic, or other specialty evaluation.
Treatment depends on the headache phenotype and contributing pain generators. Options can include medication management, rehabilitation, targeted cervical treatment, occipital nerve blocks, peripheral nerve stimulation in selected chronic cases, and botulinum toxin when the clinical diagnosis and treatment criteria support its use.
The relationship between an accident and a medical condition requires an individualized clinical assessment. Degenerative findings may predate a collision, and new or aggravated symptoms should be interpreted together with the chronology, examination, available imaging, and clinical course.
These pages connect the symptom pattern with more specific condition and treatment information.