On 22 September 2020, the European Migraine & Headache Alliance organised ‘The Missing Lesson’ webinar to raise awareness about migraine at EU level and kick-start its EU policy advocacy campaign to make migraine a European health priority.
The webinar focussed on the medical curriculum deficit when it comes to migraine. This leads to under- diagnosis and under-treatment of migraine. This creates an unnecessary burden on the people, their family and society as a whole.
MEPs Aldo Patricciello, who hosted the event and Nathalie Colin-Oesterlé showed their support to The Migraine Alliance, as well as Peter Goadsby, Prof., MD, Director of NIHR Clinical Research Facility & Professor of Neurology, Pablo Irimia, Prof, MD, Chair of the Headache Special Panel at European Academy of Neurology, Monica Ensini, European Commission, DG Research & Innovation, Policy and Programme Officer ‘Combatting diseases’ and EMHA’s executive director Elena Ruiz de la Torre.
Read the whole report here:
The Missing Lesson: Webinar Report
View the webinar here
And download the call to action here
EMHA calls upon all national and EU policy makers to fully embrace the migraine challenge and build a supportive environment that will improve the quality of life of EU citizens.
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
• Make migraine a EU health, social and research priority
• Ensure neurological disorders like migraine receive due attention in the Commission’s current and future work (gender equality, demographic change, pharmaceutical strategy, disability, education,social affairs)
• Include a ‘Brain Mission’ In Horizon Europe that also looks at migraine
• Dedicate a significant and long-term funding in neurological disorders medical and social research (Horizon Europe, IMI) to fill the migraine knowledge gap
• Ensure all Artificial Intelligence developments at EU level respond to the needs of people with migraine
• Ensure the implementation of the Work-Life Balance Directive positively affects the migraine community
• Ensure migraine is included in the delivery of the European Pillar of Social Rights and the European Semester
EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT
• Support the setting-up of a Migraine Alliance in the EP to raise awareness, influence policies and develop migraine initiatives
• Ensure migraine is enshrined in the EP work on disability, gender equality, demographic change, the pharmaceuticalstrategy
• Include migraine in the EP work on health (depression, pain, women’s health)
• Steer initiatives to better understand migraine, its development, how it affects society as a whole and how to improve the situation
• Help join forces to fight stigma associated with migraine
• Invite MEPs to be migraine ambassadors at EU and national level
NATIONAL GOVERNMENT
• Support migraine awareness campaigns to educate the public about the differences between migraine and headache
• Develop national migraine strategies with the involvement of migraine patient associations
• Ensure access to timely and quality diagnosis and access to available treatments
• Develop and support care pathways that fully address patients’ needs
• Improve the medical curriculum to dedicate sufficient time to headache disorders and migraine in particular
• Engage healthcare professionals to better diagnose migraine, discourage self-medication and drug overuse and direct patients to headache services
• Help break the stigma associated with migraine to empower people with migraine and society to be fully inclusive of people with migraine
• Adapt school and work-place legislation to give people with migraine equal opportunities to contribute to society
• Increase migraine research funding to better understand how the disease develops and affects patients and develop treatments
• Support migraine associations as key partners in awareness-raising, professional education, social support and drug development
