Does anybody know anything about Trigeminal Neuralgia?!

Does anybody know anything about Trigeminal Neuralgia?

My GP thinks I may have this but I haven't a clue what it is!

Trigeminal neuralgia, or Tic Douloureux, is a neuropathic disorder of the trigeminal nerve that causes episodes of intense pain in the eyes, lips, nose, scalp, forehead, and jaw.[1] Trigeminal neuralgia is considered by many to be among the most painful of conditions and has been labeled the suicide disease, due to the significant numbers of people taking their own lives because they were unable to have their pain controlled with medications or surgery. An estimated one in 15,000 people suffers from trigeminal neuralgia, although numbers may be significantly higher due to frequent misdiagnosis. It usually develops after the age of 40, although there have been cases with patients being as young as three years of age [2].

Symptoms

The episodes of pain occur paroxysmally, or suddenly. A number of patients develop TN after a root canal and may go repeatedly to dentists as the pain can radiate through the teeth. Extractions do not help for the pain is originating in the Trigeminal Nerve and not in an individual nerve of a tooth. Because of this difficulty, many patients may go untreated for long periods of time before a correct diagnosis is made. To describe the pain sensation, patients describe a trigger area on the face, so sensitive that touching or even air currents can trigger an episode of pain. It affects lifestyle as it can be triggered by common activities in a patient's daily life, such as toothbrushing. Breezes, whether cold or warm, wintry weather or even light touching such as a kiss can set off an attack. The attacks are said to feel like stabbing electric shocks or shooting pain that becomes intractable. Individual attacks affect one side of the face at a time, last several seconds or longer, and repeats up to hundreds of times throughout the day, or may go on for periods as long as several months or years. 3-5% of cases are bilateral, and attacks may increase in frequency or severity over time. A great deal of patients develop the pain in one branch, then over years the pain will travel through the other nerve branches.

Signs of this can be seen in males who may deliberately miss an area of their face when shaving, in order to avoid triggering an episode. Although trigeminal neuralgia is not fatal, successive recurrences may be incapacitating, and the fear of provoking an attack may make sufferers reluctant to engage in normal activities.

There is a variant of trigeminal neuralgia called "atypical trigeminal neuralgia". In some cases of atypical trigeminal neuralgia, the sufferer experiences a severe, relentless underlying pain similar to a migraine in addition to the stabbing pains. This variant is sometimes called "trigeminal neuralgia, type 2"[2], based on a recent classification of facial pain[4]. In other cases, the pain is stabbing and intense, but may feel like burning or prickling, rather than a shock. Sometimes, the pain is a combination of shock-like sensations, migraine-like pain, and burning or prickling pain. It can also feel as if a boring piercing pain is unrelenting.