Head and neck pain review: traditional and new perspectives

A variety of conditions are frequently associated with the occurrence of head and neck pain. The purposes of this review are: to describe the characteristics of several musculoskeletal, neurological, and systemic conditions frequently cited as possible causes of head and neck pain and to suggest a new technique for treating head and neck pain. The characteristics of musculoskeletal conditions, such as muscle spasm, tendinitis, trigger points, and joint inflammation, and their relationship to head and neck pain are considered. The features and clinical implications of neurologic conditions, such as atypical facial pain, trigeminal and glossopharyngeal neuralgia, reflex sympathetic dystrophy, and neurogenic inflammation, are also described. The distinguishing characteristics of headaches, including cluster, tension, chronic daily, rebound, posttraumatic, and postlumbar puncture, are detailed. This review also addresses the contributions of systemic disorders, such as osteoarthritis, rheumatoid arthritis and the variants, and rheumatoid-related conditions, like dermatomyositis, temporal arteritis, Lyme's disease, and fibromyalgia, to head and neck pain. The results of a recent pilot study of the effectiveness of intraoral circulating ice water for resolving symptoms related to head and neck pain secondary to neurogenic inflammation are presented in this work. Ice water circulating through hollow metal tubes was placed intraorally for 15 minutes in the posterior maxillary area on 12 individuals with cervical pain and muscle spasm. In nine of these individuals, reduced cervical pain perception, upper trapezius electromyography signal reduction, and increased cervical range of motion was produced. Six out of 12 individuals had accompanying headache, which was reduced or eliminated in four cases. These findings suggest a strong trigemino-cervical relationship to neck pain and headache.