Trigeminal neuralgia is a chronic pain condition, involving the fifth cranial nerve which is responsible for carrying sensation for a human face and brain. In this condition, even the slightest movement to your face would trigger such unbearable pain, which could be described as one of the most excruciating pain ever known to humanity. And the patient would be deprived form common daily things like brushing teeth or doing makeup.
The pain involves almost all the lower face including the lower face and jaw, and sometimes it could also extend to the nose and above the eye. The pain can extend towards the forehead, cheek, and lower jaw. When the trigeminal nerve gets irritable because of various reasons, you could feel intense, electric shock-like pain, which would be limited to one side of your face. These painful episodes could be light, but if left untreated, these attacks could get worsened.
There are 2 types of trigeminal neuralgia
-Type 1-
In this type, you would feel an intense stabbing pain in your mouth, which could extend to your cheek, nose and can cover one side of the face.
-Type 2-
In this category, the pain would be less but constant.
What could be the possible reasons for your neuralgia?
The exact reason for trigeminal neuralgia is not known, but available evidence suggests that in most cases the pain is caused by pressing of the nerve ending, which causes inflammation. This phenomenon is known as the primary terminal neuralgia.
How can you avoid the pain?
Those painful attacks of trigeminal neuralgia are triggered because of various reasons, which could worsen the condition. So the easiest way is to avoid those triggers.
For example,
-if your pain is triggered by wind, then wearing a scarf or covering your ears and face would help to calm your pain.
-Avoid hot, spicy food and cold drinks which could trigger your neuralgia. Or when you’re are having these food or drinks avoid direct contacts like using a straw or a spoon. And use the minimum movement of the mouth to avoid painful areas of the mouth.
-Eat more healthy and wholesome meals, which are easy to digest. And use more liquid in your diet to lessen your difficulty in chewing.
-Some foods including caffeine, citrus fruits, and bananas tend to trigger pain in some people suffering from trigeminal neuralgia, so the best thing would be to avoid such things.
Treatment and its effectiveness?
Many procedures are available to ease up the pain caused by trigeminal neuralgia. But the best treatment will be always to identify those triggers of pain and avoid them.
Medication-
General painkillers like paracetamol are not effective in treating trigeminal neuralgia. So instead of painkillers, your physician would prescribe anticonvulsants, which were not originally designed for pain management. But those anticonvulsants can relieve your nerve pain by slowing down their electrical impulses and decreases their ability to send pain signals.
Take medications based on your physician’s guidance. Because in this process of treatment it’s important to increase your dosage slowly without rushing. And as your pain decreases, your dosage will also be reduced over weeks.
Taking too many medicines too soon, or stopping the medication suddenly could cause serious complications.
Anticonvulsants are the first choice of treatment. But when the patient is either having side effects or becomes unresponsive to the medications, surgery would be the only effective option available.
Surgery-
If the medication either could not provide sufficient relief to the patient or causing harmful side effects. So next possible treatment option would be surgery. Many irrelevant procedures could worsen the condition for the treatment of trigeminal neuralgia. So have a proper discussion with your specialist, about the potential benefits and risks before making any decision.
The information provided above is about trigeminal neuralgia is important. And everyone should at least have an idea about what it is, and how you can prevent yourself from it.