Lifting The Burden envisions a future in which headache disorders are recognised everywhere as real, disabling and deserving of medical care. In this future, access to treatment is available to all who need it, without artificial barriers. At present, although headache disorders are common and disabling the world over (with migraine alone ranking amongst WHO's top 20 causes of disability), and although effective treatments for headache exist, these do not reach most of the people who would benefit from them.
Lifting The Burden is a programme of joint action by the World Health Organization (WHO), the International Headache Society (IHS), the European Headache Federation (EHF) and the World Headache Alliance (WHA). It is conceived as a global campaign. It aims first to know the scope and scale of the burden caused by headache in all parts of the world, second to raise awareness of this burden and third to put in place health-care solutions that will alleviate it, region by region. Therefore, the work of Lifting The Burden proceeds within three stages:
Stage 1: acquiring the knowledge needed for action;
Stage 2: using this knowledge to raise awareness - amongst the public, health-care providers and, importantly, health-care policy-makers;
Stage 3: exploiting awareness to work with local agencies in the pursuit and achievement of beneficial change.
The first priority is Stage 1, but to some extent the others, particularly preparations for Stage 3, can be and are being commenced in parallel. For example, the prevalence surveys described earlier produce results that are part of knowledge for action. Management aids are an important contribution to better diagnosis and treatment, which are key components of beneficial change.
The global campaign is a hugely ambitious project, but each small part of it achieved is a success. To make it manageable, activities are distributed amongst many working groups, each with limited and specific objectives, acting at global, regional or local/national levels.
For much more information about Lifting The Burden, visit http://www.l-t-b.org.