Differential diagnosis of Costen's syndrome and cerebellopontine angle tumours

Abstract

Relevance. Our study aimed to determine the main differential diagnosis criteria for temporomandibular joint (TMJ) pain dysfunction syndrome (temporomandibular disorders, Costen's syndrome) and cerebellopontine angle tumours.
Materials and methods. We examined 22 people (19 women and three men), aged 21 to 74 years (mean age 37.2 ± 5.1 years), who presented to the prosthodontic clinic with facial pain.
Results. The study proposed the following differential diagnostic criteria for TMJ pain dysfunction syndrome and brain tumors: different nature of pain, unilateral ear noise; distal displacement of the mandibular head diagnosed by cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), as well as articular disc displacement (detected by MRI) in temporomandibular disorders. Unilateral facial burning pain indicated meningioma of the cerebellopontine angle, which head MRI confirmed.
Conclusion. The proposed table for evaluating clinical and paraclinical study methods for patients with facial pain helps to differentiate the cause of pain properly and proceed with the optimal treatment method.