Comparative Analysis of Balloon Compression and Radiofrequency Ablation in Idiopathic Trigeminal Neuralgia: A Retrospective Study with a 24-Month Follow-up

Özet

Objective: Trigeminal neuralgia (TN) is a common cause of facial pain, with a prevalence of 40 per million. This paper is a retrospective24-month follow-up study of 20 patients with idiopathic drug-resistant TN who underwent balloon compression (BC) or radiofrequency ablation(RFA).Methods: When neuralgia affected more than one divisions or it involved ophthalmic division, BC was performed. RFA was performed inneuralgia involving isolated mandibular or maxillary division.Results: At all the time points, numerical rating score (NRS) was lower in the BC group, but the difference was not significant. The proportionof patients developing recurrence of pain was lower in the BC group, but the difference was not significant (p-value 0.63). The proportion of patients requiring a repeat procedure was lower in the BC group, but the difference was not significant. There was no significant correlation amongrecurrence of pain, age of the patient and number of divisions in which neuralgia was present. In BC, a pear shape of the balloon is desirable,but this shape is not always achievable. Recurrence of pain in the BC group was comparable to that in the available literature, but the recurrencerate in the RFA group was comparatively higher. The complications in BC were higher, but they were transient and improved with time.Conclusion: BC and RFA are effective modalities of treatment for idiopathic TN with comparable results. In TN involving multiple divisions,BC may be more convenient.