Cure is the wrong word for it, because tension-type headache is a tendency rather than a disease with an endpoint. What is realistic, and common, is reducing it to occasional and mild. People with near-daily headache frequently improve substantially.
Cure is the wrong word for it, because tension-type headache is a tendency rather than a disease with an endpoint. What is realistic, and common, is reducing it to occasional and mild. People with near-daily headache frequently improve substantially.
There is no lesion to remove and no infection to clear. Tension-type headache is a pattern the nervous system falls into under a combination of influences, and almost everyone experiences it occasionally - infrequent episodic headache is close to universal and is not a disease state. So the meaningful question is not whether it can be eliminated but how far the frequency can be pushed down. Framing it as an illness to be eliminated tends to produce escalating treatment for something that responds better to changing the conditions that sustain it.
Reducing acute medication to a safe number of days a month is usually the largest single change, and it often makes things briefly worse before better, which is worth knowing in advance so it is not read as failure. Then: regular sleep, treating obstructive sleep apnoea where present, workstation and posture adjustment, treating jaw clenching, moderating caffeine, regular exercise, and addressing depression and anxiety. Preventive medication by class where frequency stays high. Several of these are unglamorous and they are where the results actually come from.
Almost always because the diagnosis or a driver has been missed rather than because the headache is untreatable. The commonest is unrecognised migraine, which is frequently labelled tension headache when nausea is not prominent and which responds to entirely different treatment. Next is continuing medication overuse. Then cervicogenic headache from the upper neck, which is side-locked and provoked by neck movement. Untreated sleep apnoea, bruxism, uncorrected vision and untreated mood disorders all sustain it. Each is identifiable.
For someone with chronic tension-type headache, moving from headache on most days to a handful of mild days a month is a good and achievable result, and it is what treatment aims at. Complete and permanent absence is not a promise anyone can make, and treatment that claims it should be treated with caution. Progress is measured by counting headache days and medication days rather than by impression, because the trend is visible in a diary before it is noticeable in daily life. Adults 18 and older, at either office.
Clinical Neurology Specialists has been physician-owned since 1998, when Leo Germin, M.D., FAANEM founded it. Five board-certified neurologists and four advanced practice providers see patients at the Las Vegas and Henderson offices, each with its own AANEM-accredited electrodiagnostic laboratory.
Clinical Neurology Specialists is an adult outpatient neurology practice for patients 18 and older. The practice performs no surgery and operates no imaging suite, infusion suite or interventional pain programme, and provides no emergency or inpatient care.
Physician-reviewed. Reviewed by the physicians of Clinical Neurology Specialists — board-certified neurologists, AANEM-accredited electrodiagnostic laboratories, physician-owned since 1998. Reviewed 1 August 2026. This article is general education for adults 18 and older and is not a substitute for a consultation.
Sources and further reading: MedlinePlus: tension headache; MedlinePlus: headache; American Academy of Neurology.
Adults 18 and older, at the Las Vegas and Henderson offices. Call 702-804-1212 or request an appointment online.