<unk>  This disorder is characterized by episodes of severe facial pain along the trigeminal nerve divisions. The trigeminal nerve is a paired cranial nerve that has three major branches: the ophthalmic nerve (V1), the maxillary nerve (V2), and the mandibular nerve (V3). One, two, or all three branches of the nerve may be affected.<unk>  most commonly involves the middle branch (the maxillary nerve or V2) and lower branch (mandibular nerve or V3) of the trigeminal nerve. An individual attack usually lasts from a few seconds to several minutes or hours, but these can repeat for hours with very short intervals between attacks. In other instances, only 4–10 attacks are experienced daily. The episodes of intense pain may occur paroxysmally. To describe the pain sensation, people often describe a trigger area on the face so sensitive that touching or even air currents can trigger an episode; however, in many people, the pain is generated spontaneously without any apparent stimulation. It affects lifestyle as it can be triggered by common activities such as eating, talking, shaving and brushing teeth. The wind, chewing, and talking can aggravate the condition in many patients. The attacks are said, by those affected, to feel like stabbing electric shocks, burning, sharp, pressing, crushing, exploding or shooting pain that becomes intractable. The pain also tends to occur in cycles with remissions lasting months or even years. Pain attacks are known to worsen in frequency or severity over time, in some people. Pain may migrate to other branches over time but in some people remains very stable. 1–6% of cases occur on both sides of the face but extremely rare for both to be affected at the same time. This normally indicates problems with both trigeminal nerves, since one serves strictly the left side of the face and the other serves the right side. Rapid spreading of the pain, bilateral involvement or simultaneous participation with other major nerve trunks (such as Painful Tic Convulsif of nerves V & VII or occurrence of symptoms in the V and IX nerves) may suggest a systemic cause. Systemic causes could include multiple sclerosis or expanding cranial tumors. The severity of the pain makes it difficult to wash the face, shave, and perform good oral hygiene. The pain has a significant impact on activities of daily living especially as sufferers live in fear of when they are going to get their next attack of pain and how severe it will be. It can lead to severe depression and anxiety. However, not all people will have the symptoms described above and there are variants of<unk> . One of which is atypical<unk>  <unk> , type 2" or<unk>  with concomitant pain), based on a recent classification of facial pain. In these instances there is also a more prolonged lower severity background pain that can be present for over 50% of the time and is described more as a burning or prickling, rather than a shock. Trigeminal pain can also occur after an attack of herpes zoster, and post-herpetic<unk>  has the same manifestations as in other parts of the body. Trigeminal deafferentation pain (TDP), also termed anesthesia dolorosa, is from intentional damage to a trigeminal nerve following attempts to surgically fix a nerve problem. This pain is usually constant with a burning sensation and numbness. TDP is very difficult to treat as further surgeries are usually ineffective and possibly detrimental to the person.
Trigeminal neuralgia
Postherpetic neuralgia
Occipital neuralgia
Cluster headache
Trigeminal autonomic cephalgia
Atypical trigeminal neuralgia
Thunderclap headache
Trigeminal trophic syndrome