Driving is an important part of life for many people. Whether you commute to work by car or rely on driving to see friends and family, it’s important to know whether driving with chronic migraine could put you at risk. Many people with migraine can and do drive safely.

Read on to learn whether it’s safe to drive during a migraine attack or while taking migraine medication. You’ll also discover preparation tips so you’ll be ready if you feel an attack coming on while driving.

Driving With Migraine: Is It Safe?

Many people with migraine are concerned about their ability to drive safely. About 45 percent of Canadian drivers with migraine said in a survey that they worry about driving because of headaches.

To stay safe while driving, the two main things to avoid are driving during a migraine attack and driving while taking medication that affects your ability to drive. Read the warnings on all medications, and don’t drive while drowsy, dizzy, or otherwise unable to do so safely.

What Does the Research Say?

Overall, studies on how much migraine affects driving safety are limited. Some studies have indicated that people who have migraine attacks are involved in slightly more motor vehicle crashes overall than people who do not.

One study in New Zealand found that about 18 percent of people with a history of migraine had a motor vehicle crash in the recent past, compared with 10 percent of people with no migraine history. In a similar study in Canada, 12 percent of those with migraine reported crashes versus 7`.

The best way to decide whether you can drive safely is to evaluate your own symptoms and to speak with your doctor.

How Migraine Symptoms Affect Driving

Many symptoms of a migraine attack can harm your ability to drive. Being able to drive safely likely depends on what symptoms you have, how severe they are, and how suddenly they arise.

Head and Neck Pain

Head and neck pain are common in migraine and could affect your driving. Your driving may be impacted if your pain limits the range of motion of your head.

Pain can also slow your reaction time, make it harder to pay attention to tasks, and make it harder to make good decisions. If your pain impacts you in any of these ways, that could make it harder to drive safely.

Head pain is most common in the midst of an attack, while neck pain is most common in the postdrome phase (after the attack).

Cognitive Impairment

Whether it happens because of pain or on its own, many people with migraine complain of cognitive dysfunction, a blanket term for difficulty thinking clearly. People with migraine can experience difficulty paying attention, poor memory, and slowed reaction time.

These cognitive symptoms can arise at any stage in a migraine attack, such as during the aura phase, the actual symptom flare, or afterward.

“Sometimes, a migraine coming on has caused me to become frozen and unable to move, or go into a dead faint. For years, I was unable to drive a car because I didn’t know when I would lose my vision or pass out. Those were some very rough years for me,” one MyMigraineTeam member shared.

Sleepiness and Fatigue

Migraine can cause sleep disturbances and also make you tired or drowsy. Tired driving is dangerous. The U.S. government estimates that drowsy driving caused more than 90,000 car crashes in 2017 alone, leading to more than 50,000 injuries and 800 deaths.

If you feel sleepy, don’t get behind the wheel. If you become overly tired while driving, pull your car off the road to a safe stopping place and take a short nap.

Fatigue and tiredness most commonly happen during the prodrome (pre-attack) and postdrome phases of a migraine attack, although they can also be present during the headache phase. And if your sleep is disturbed by migraine in general, you may be sleep-deprived and often feel tired.

“Fatigue is always part of my prodrome phase, but is part of my postdrome sometimes, too,” one MyMigraineTeam member shared. “I passed out twice while driving last year,” another shared.

Dizziness

Many people with migraine describe getting vertigo and feeling out of balance, lightheaded, or faint. Dizziness can happen in the prodrome phase, attack phase, or postdrome phase, depending on the person. Migraine attacks that cause dizziness are sometimes called vestibular migraines.

Becoming dizzy or disoriented while driving can be dangerous and cause an accident. A study of driving safety in people with vertigo or dizziness found high rates of self-reported difficulty driving. Some people in the study had been advised by their doctors not to drive, but continued to do so due to a lack of alternative transportation.

“When I have a migraine attack, I get really dizzy. I work 15 minutes from home, and I will start to get really dizzy on my drive home. There are days when, on the drive to work, the sun flashing through the trees will make my head hurt, and I will have to deal with the migraine at work because I cannot afford not to work,” one member shared.

Visual Disturbances

Visual disturbances like blurred vision, flashes of light, blind spots, and photophobia (sensitivity to light) are common before a migraine attack in people who experience visual auras. Some people also get visual disturbances during or after an attack.

Anything that interferes with your ability to see clearly will reduce your ability to drive safely. Without the ability to see clearly, you may miss seeing a pedestrian, an object in the road, or the lane markers. If you experience visual disturbances, stop your car in a safe place.

Photophobia can be especially dangerous when driving at night, when you are facing the headlights of oncoming traffic.

“I have passed out a couple of times. Sometimes I lose my vision completely,” shared one member.

“My aura will wipe out my vision in a split second, changing to a bright yellow light, then wham, migraine. Other times vision blurs completely, then the migraine attack comes,” shared another.

Be Prepared

To make sure you’re prepared, it’s a good idea to carry your medications with you while driving and keep plenty of water in your car. That way, if you see some signs of a migraine attack approaching, you might be able to stop or reduce its impact.

You could also consider keeping ice packs, heating pads, snacks, or other comfort items in your car.

Join the Conversation

On MyMigraineTeam, people share their experiences with migraine, get advice, and find support from others who understand.

What do you do when you get a migraine attack while driving? Let others know in the comments below.