Severe Migraines Strongly Tied to High Blood Pressure in Teens

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A large new study of more than 2 million adolescents found a strong link between migraine headaches and high blood pressure (hypertension) — a connection researchers have suspected for years but had not clearly shown in young people until now.

Migraine, a condition that affects approximately 1 billion people globally, is a neurological disorder defined as recurrent, disabling headaches that are often coupled with visual or sensory aura. Some data have indicated migraines are linked to the vascular system — particularly hypertension — which has been supported by the elevated risk of certain vascular diseases, the involvement of intracranial blood vessels, and the shared treatments used to manage migraine and high blood pressure.

“The association between migraine and hypertension has been studied in cross-sectional studies, and a positive association was suggested,” wrote the team of investigators. “In addition, a cohort study reported a small but significant increase in the risk of hypertension among individuals with migraines.”

However, a knowledge gap in the connection between the two conditions remain due to lack of research and participant limitations — with some studies including older patients and populations where hypertension is more common, and migraine is less common.

“A distinctive feature of our study population lies in the age range of the study participants, 16 to 20 years,” investigators explained. “This period corresponds to the peak incidence of migraine in boys (15-19 years) and precedes the peak in women (20-24 years). Most studies on the association between migraine and hypertension encompass a broader age range, with some having an average participant age of 60 to 80 years.”

The current study included 2,155,077 teens around age 17 who were screened for mandatory military service in Israel between 1990 and 2019. Everyone had their blood pressure checked, and anyone with numbers in a certain range went through a full medical evaluation. Migraine diagnoses were confirmed only by board-certified neurologists, which makes the data especially reliable. While the study population was considered nationally representative, certain ethnic groups were not included in the assessment.

Investigators found that teens with migraines (61,314 adolescents) were about three times more likely to also have high blood pressure compared with those without migraines. While hypertension was still uncommon overall, it was clearly higher in adolescents with migraines (0.7%) than in those without (0.2%).

The link became even stronger when the team looked at teens with more severe migraines. These adolescents had more than four times the odds of having hypertension. The pattern also held when looking at how serious the high blood pressure was. Teens with migraines were more likely to have severe high blood pressure than mild cases.

Investigators emphasized that the study doesn’t prove that migraines cause high blood pressure (or vice versa), but it does show that the two conditions appear together more often than expected. They say this is important because hypertension in teenagers can go unnoticed and may lead to health problems later in life if not caught early.

The takeaway for families: Teens who experience migraines — especially frequent or severe ones — may benefit from routine blood pressure checks. Early detection gives patients and families a better chance to manage hypertension and reduce future risks.

“Our findings are of public health importance,” concluded investigators. “Migraine and hypertension are both highly prevalent diseases, leading to substantial disability and mortality.”