Abstract
Chronic facial pain continues to challenge the neurosurgeon to use and devise new methods of surgical treatment. This paper describes 13 patients with intractable pain of the face who were treated by coagulation of the trigeminal nucleus caudalis at the cervico-medullary junction. Noxious stimuli from the trigeminal distribution relay via the secondary neurons that make up the nucleus caudalis, and these secondary neurons project directly to the midbrain and thalamic centers associated with nociception. The operation differs from the medullary tractotomy originally described by Sjoquist (6) and others in that the nucleus itself is destroyed by multiple small thermal lesions using the DREZ electrode.
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References
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© 1986 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Nashold, B.S., Lopes, H., Chodakiewitz, J., Bronec, P. (1986). Trigeminal DREZ for Craniofacial Pain. In: Samii, M. (eds) Surgery in and around the Brain Stem and the Third Ventricle. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-71240-1_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-71240-1_4
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-71242-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-71240-1
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive