Clinical investigation of temporomandibular joint lesions

• Published in: Journal of the Japanese Society for the Temporomandibular Joint Vol. 6; no. 3; pp. 532 - 543
• Main Authors: IIHAMA, Tsuyoshi, SUGIURA, Masashi, KATO, Joji, SHIBUYA, Yoshiyuki, TSUCHIKAWA, Kohzo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English; Japanese
• Published: The Japanese Society for Temporomandibular Joint 1994; 一般社団法人 日本顎関節学会
• Subjects: classification; predilection; temporomandibular joint lesions; 疾患分類; 発症頻度; 顎関節疾患
• ISSN: 0915-3004; 1884-4308
• DOI: 10.11246/gakukansetsu1989.6.532

The purpose of this clinical analysis is to determine the prevalence and clinical features specific to different types of TMJ lesions. The subjects of this study were of 1029 cases of TMJ lesions, accumulated between the establishment of our Department, Apr. 1974, and the end of 1991, almost 18 years. 13512 patients had visited in this clinic during this period, so the morbidity of the TMJ lesions was 7.62%. Athrosis, which has been generally so called in Japan, is the most common lesion, with 821 cases (79.8%). There were 161 trauma cases, (15.6%), consisting of condylar 199 cases of fracture, 31 of luxation and 11 of traumatic arthritis. There were 35 cases (3.4%) of inflammation, consisting of 33 cases of rheumatoid arthritis, 1 case of purulentic arthritis, and 1 case of arthritis due to a specific infection. Developmental anomalies and ankylosis were found in 5 cases each. The other 3 cases were temporomandibular joint dysfunction: due to malunion after the fracture of the maxillary bone in 2 cases and to osteoradionecrosis in 1 case. Neoplasms of the TMJ have been described as those not only of the component tissues of TMJ, such as bone, cartilage, synovial tissue, and capsule, but also those metastasized from the other organs and infiltrated from the adjacent tissues or organs. However, there has been no case of the neoplasms consisting of the components, and it was possibly difficult to count the cases of the neoplasms metastasized or infiltrated from other organ tissues. Compareing the trends for gender, there were twice as many females as males. However, condylar fracture and traumatic arthritis were observed move in males than females. On the trends for age, rheumatoid arthritis was the highest, with 51.2 years as the mean age, followed by luxation, at 41.5 years. The youngest was traumatic arthritis, with 22.7 years.