Marijus Leketas, Andrius Pajėda, Rokas Kuprys, Albinas Gervickas
Abstract
Pain is a crucial clinical, social and economical problem. Patients with trigeminal neuralgia, making up about 15-20% of all peripheral nervous system diseases, are especially suffering with pain. Trigeminal neuralgia – highly intensive sharp pain in one or both sides of the face. The disorder is caused by an inflammation of the trigeminal nerve (nervus trigeminus), the fifth cranial nerve composed of three branches. We compared trigeminal neuralgia treatment methods, that are used for patients hospitalised in Maxillofacial Surgery Clinic of Lithuanian University of Health Sciences Kaunas Clinics. Here are three main techniques for treating trigeminal neuralgia: pharmacotherapy, alcohol injection and surgical operation. The aim of our study was to analyse effectiveness (duration of disease remission period) of those treatment methods and to compare them with each other. According to our study we can conclude that the most effective method of trigeminal neuralgia treatment is surgical, resulting in a 27.53 months remission, less efficient are pharmacotherapy, resulting in a 15.51 months remission, and alcohol injections, resulting in a 12.89 months remission.
doi:10.5200/sm-hs.2012.108
Keyword(s): neuralgia; alcoholization; surgical treatment
DOI: 10.5200/353
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