#38 Diagnostic Problems That are Actually TMD/TMJ

I very rarely meet anyone in public who has not heard the diagnosis “TMJ”.

Most people have a vague idea of the symptoms of TMD/TMJ unless they, or a friend or family member suffers from the symptoms.  In those cases, they can accurately describe the symptoms. Almost always the description involves one or more of the following:, 1. headache, 2. neck pain, 3. earache, and 4. jaw pain. I call these the “Big Four”, because they are the most common, and arranged in order of frequency with headache being the most common, neck pain the second most common etc.

When doing a patient consultation, I always do a symptom review which covers the other common symptoms of tinnitus, subjective hearing loss, vertigo, upper back and shoulder pain, arm/hand/finger tingling and numbness, and jaw locking.  After finishing the symptom list, I often hear the patient say, “Do you mean my dizziness and shoulder pain is also coming from my jaw joints?”  The answer is yes, it is very likely that if you have one or more of the common symptoms of TMD/TMJ the lesser known but common symptoms are also created from the TMJ.

However, there are several symptoms of inflammation within the TMJ that are rarely equated to TMJ/TMD.  Pain behind the eyes, blurred vision, flashing lights, decreased field of vision, burning tongue, facial tics, numb facial areas, sinus pain, dental pain, teeth not fitting together properly, torticollis, ear infection, trigeminal neuralgia, and even chest pain thought to be a heart attack have been confused with other diagnoses and resolved when the inflammation within the TMJ was eliminated.  I am not saying that each of these symptoms cannot have an alternate cause.  What I am saying is each of these symptoms can be caused by the inflammation of TMJ/TMD and TMD should be considered when considering treatment to solve the problem.

I have seen each of these lesser known and odd symptoms resolve along with the more common symptoms when unloading the temporomandibular joint using a posterior dis-occluding device (Urbanek Device and Protocol).  Listening carefully to each patient describe their unique symptoms has brought me to the conclusion that there is a lot more to learn about TMJ/TMD.

Here at TMJ Services of Brentwood we listen to our patients.  Listening to my patients actually gave me the original key that brought about the non-surgical solution that has successfully treated over 4000 patients in our practice alone.  Our patented and FDA cleared device is now being used by a growing number of doctors throughout the United States.

If you have one or more of the common symptoms, or even an odd symptom that has no explanation request a consultation.  We are here to help.