Nowadays stress is one of the most frequent enemies of our lives and one of the major culprits of very common diseases, such as tension headache.
Often, this type of tension or stress headache is related to disorders of the temporomandibular joint (TMJ), which is the joint formed by the upper part of the jaw and the temporal bone of the skull, which acts as a sliding hinge and can sometimes present us with problems due to the complexity of the movements it performs.
Temporal headache may be due to different causes:
- Degenerative pathologies
- Tumor pathology
- Due to trauma
- Due to bad habits, such as bruxism.
In any case, it is necessary that a specialist in Maxillofacial Surgery performs a complete clinical and radiological study in order to establish a diagnosis and thus propose the most appropriate intervention.
Treatments for TMJ disorders
The Maxillofacial Institute offers three types of treatments to correct temporomandibular joint disorders according to their diagnosis:
- Conservative treatment: therapies are performed with custom-made stabilization splints, along with maxillofacial physiotherapy sessions.
- Surgical treatment: arthrocentesis (extraction of joint fluid), arthroscopy (visualization of the inside of the joint by means of a mini-camera) or, in more adverse situations, by replacing the joint with a prosthesis.
- Maxillofacial physiotherapy: this is the least invasive treatment. It is focused on the re-education of harmful habits that cause and/or promote pain/disorder to the cranio-mandibular system.