ABSTRACT
One hundred seventeen patients, aged 16-75 years, with orofacial pains were studied. Borderline psychic disorders were detected in 106 cases, schizophrenia--in 11 cases. Facial pain was characterized by (1) polymorphism of sensations changing their site and duration, (2) absence of orofacial sensory deficits, (3) symptoms "mosaic"--a combination of separate signs specific for various "organic" facial pain, (4) absence of objective changes in oral cavity and facial region, (5) key role of psychoemotional factors in pain recurrence and intensification, (6) non-opioid analgesics and carbamazepine inefficacy. A systematics for facial pains of psychic genesis, comprising two groups of disorders, was elaborated. The first group includes facial pain and odontalgia in borderline psychic disorders--neurotic (somatoform, hypochondriac and hysteric) disorders, affective ones (mild depressive episodes and dystimia) and paranoic personality disorder. The second group comprises orofacial cenesthopathies in neurotic-like (schizotypal disorders) and paranoid types of schizophrenia.
Subject(s)
Facial Pain/etiology , Mental Disorders/psychology , Adolescent , Adult , Aged , Chronic Disease , Diagnosis, Differential , Facial Pain/diagnosis , Female , Humans , Male , Mental Disorders/diagnosis , Middle Aged , Pain Measurement , Severity of Illness IndexABSTRACT
The authors carried out clinical and psychological examinations of 50 men and 50 women suffering from malignant tumours of the lower extremities before and after the operation (amputation of the affected extremity). The patients remained under observation for a year and a half. In all the patients reactive states were diagnosed the clinical picture and the time course of which has substantial differences in the male and the female groups. In the men the violent onset of the reactive state gave place first to a relative compensation and then to a depressive-hypochondriacal development of the personality. In the women the reaction was noted 3 to 4 months after the operation, and later they developed psychopathy-like disturbances.
