Habituation or lack of habituation: What is really lacking in migraine?

Abstract

Migraine is very prevalent disease with consistent disability and socioeconomic burden (Lipton et al., 2007). Despite intensive research effort, particularly in last decades, allowing significant insight in many aspects of the disease, its precise pathophysiological bases remain still to be defined. One influential view suggests that dysfunctions in sensory information processing could play a critical role (de Tommaso et al., 2014). In this frame a relevant phenomenological marker is considered the inability of migraine patients to habituate to repeated sensory stimulation.