The Effectiveness of Compassion-Focused Therapy for Improving Emotional Control and Reducing the Severity of Pain in Migraine Patients

Introduction: Due to the unwanted effects of the migraine headaches of the patient and the role played by excitement and stress in the development and exacerbation of such headaches, migraine headaches are considered among psychosomatic disorders affecting the psychological life of the patients. The present study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of compassion-focused therapy (CFT) for improving emotional control and reducing the severity of pain in patients with migraine. Materials and methods:  This is a semi-experimental research with pre-test, post-test with a control group. A total number of 30 patients with migraine of Isfahan Al-Zahra Hospital were selected and randomly divided into experimental and control groups. The research instruments included the Emotion Control Questionnaire (ECQ), Questionnaire of von Korff for Grading the Severity of Chronic Pain and the Migraine Disability Assessment (MIDAS) questionnaire. The experimental group underwent eight 90-minutes sessions of compassion-focused therapy (CFT), and both groups underwent the post-test after finishing the training sessions. Analysis of the data involved both descriptive and inferential statistics including mean, standard deviation, multivariate analysis of covariance (MANCOVA) and analysis of covariance (ANCOVA). Results: The results showed that the training based on compassion-focused therapy (CFT) had a significant effect on improving emotional control and its subscales (F =21.81; P <0.01), as well as reducing pain severity in patients with migraine (F =17.21; P <0.01). Conclusion: Therefore, in the course of the treatment of migraine patients, compassion-focused therapy (CFT) can be a useful supplementary approach along with medications.