TRIGEMINAL NEURALGIA

Abstract

Of major trigeminal neuralgia or tic douloureux there would seem to be little to say that has not already been written, but there are many angles, many aspects of the disease that do not appear in current literature. In the neurosurgical clinic one gets the impression that the disease is commonplace. We have on our records some 794 cases of major neuralgia, not to speak of 202 cases of the atypical forms, and yet in the lifetime of the busiest practitioner not more than two or three cases, if any, will have been seen. Major trigeminal neuralgia would seem, on the face of it, a clinical entity so unmistakable in its expression that it could not be confused with anything else. Perhaps in the majority of instances this is true, but judging from the number of patients referred to the neurosurgical clinic for alcoholic injection who do not require either