Sexual desire, an unexpected migraine comorbidity? Both have been linked to levels of serotonin and a recent study explored whether they were truly related. According to a press release on the study “researchers hypothesized that abnormalities in the serotonin systems of migraine sufferers may influence their sexual desire. Because high levels of serotonin are associated with low sexual desire, and migraine sufferers have low levels of the chemical, it was predicted that they would report higher levels of sex drive.”
And indeed they did. In a study with 68 participants, migraineurs reported levels of sexual desire that were 20% higher than that of people with tension-type headache. The results also indicate that migraineurs may have higher levels of sex drive than the general population.
WebMD’s article on the study also considers whether an orgasm could be a migraine abortive.