Volume 28 - Issue 3

Pursuant to a lecture on “The Role of the Cervical Spine and Physical Therapy in the Management of Temporomandibular Disorders” that I presented at the recent meeting of the American Equilibration Society, I was invited to write a guest editorial for the Journal of Craniomandibular Practice (CRANIO). After much thought about the many previous clinical and scientific publications on this subject that I, as well as my colleagues, have published, I decided to focus on ...

In America today, we face many challenging issues in the delivery of quality health care. These issues have been further clouded with recent passage of health care reform legislation. This brief dissertation serves to call your attention to but one challenge, chronic pain in women's health. It is a nonrelenting challenge that deserves our full attention, dedication and perseverance.  Emily Dickinson, the American poet, once wrote:

       “We never know how high we are

         Till ...

Temporomandibular disorders (TMD) are a group of functional disorders of the masticatory system. Signs and symptoms of TMD are very common in different age groups in both genders. Treatment need varies greatly, ranging from 5 to 27% of the population. The treatment of TMD patients is generally initiated using reversible conservative methods and if necessary, irreversible and surgical methods are used. Altogether 123 patients (93 females, 30 males, mean age 39 years, range 12 to ...

Hyaluronate acid (HA) injections are gaining attention as a treatment option to manage symptoms of temporomandibular joint (TMJ) disorders, but updated evidence-based data on their effectiveness are actually lacking. The present paper aims to summarize and review systematically the clinical studies on the use of hyaluronic acid injections to treat TMJ disorders performed over the last decade. On November 9, 2009, a systematic search in the National Library of Medicine’s PubMed (http://www.ncbi ...

The purpose of this study was to determine if compression of the mandibular nerve and its branches could be caused by antero-medial disk displacement, resulting in atypical facial pain. Sixteen temporomandibular joints (TMJ) were dissected and injected with an autopolymerizing solution into the superior compartment, which produced an artificial capsular swelling that caused disk displacement. In all specimens, the TMJ capsule was close to the mandibular branch of the trigeminal nerve after the intracapsular injection ...

The aim of this study was to investigate the clinical features of stomatognathic dysfunction in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). The study sample consisted of 40 patients with RA (34 female, 6  male), mean age 44 years, recruited at the Rheumatology Division of the Department of Internal Medicine, University of Pisa, Italy. The inclusion criteria were diagnosis of RA according to the criteria of the American Rheumatism Association (ARA). In the study, 82.5% (n ...

To evaluate the effect of cigarette smoking (CS) on pain intensity in a sample of temporomandibular disorder (TMD) patients, 352 clinical charts were reviewed. Subjects were first divided into two groups: smokers (YS) and nonsmokers (NS); then, YS were further divided into three subgroups: light smokers (LS), moderate smokers (MS), and heavy smokers (HS). Overall TMD pain intensity was higher in YS, compared to NS, and a correlation was found between pain intensity and the ...

Orthodontic treatment for a patient who has had a displaced disk or disks and has been stabilized by anterior repositioning splint therapy presents the dentist with a difficult orthodontic problem. Frequently, there is a posterior open bite present, with the anterior teeth only occluding in the stabilized TMJ position upon removal of the splint. The current articles (Part I of II presented here) will present an organized TMJ/orthodontic diagnosis (Part I) and orthodontic treatment ...

An unusual case of an isolated fracture of the coronoid mandibular process is presented. The fracture was randomly discovered after a panoramic radiograph was taken for surgical purposes. There were no clinical findings or symptoms by the patient. A careful review of the literature of fractures of the coronoid process is presented, since the isolated coronoid fracture is the rarest occurrence of all facial fractures.

Facial injuries are common during workplace accidents. These incidents are also associated with an increase in both mortality and morbidity rates. The following case describes a 40 year-old white Hispanic patient with paroxysmal facial pain on the right side, one year in duration. The patient reported facial trauma as a result of a direct fall thought to be related to his pain complaints five months prior to arriving at the New Jersey Dental School emergency ...