Facial Pain Center
The Facial Pain Center at NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital offers a wide range of treatments for those suffering from chronic facial pain.
Facial pain can come from a variety of causes - from dental problems, nerve problems, and facial trauma to multiple sclerosis, stroke, or a tumor.
At the NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital Facial Pain Center, our neurologists often begin investigating with a brief examination focusing on muscle movement and feeling in the face. A magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) or computerized tomography (CT) scan allows the doctor to check for tumors or blood vessel abnormalities.
Treatment for Facial Pain
Medications that lessen or block pain signals to the brain are the typical initial treatment for facial pain.
At NewYork-Presbyterian Brooklyn Methodist Hospital surgical options include a variety of procedures designed to prevent pain signals from being sent to the brain. Depending on the location of the pain, alcohol injections, glycerol injections, electric currents, and balloon compression are all different surgical techniques that might be used to block pain signals and minimize the pain experienced by our patients.
We also offer another surgical procedure, microvascular decompression, which involves moving blood vessels in contact with the trigeminal nerve without damaging it, providing the most effective and longest lasting treatment for facial pain.
Two newer treatments, motor cortex stimulation and deep-brain stimulation, rely on the implantation of electrodes in various parts of the brain. Small electrical charges are then fine tuned by a neurologist and neurosurgeon to manipulate faulty neural circuits to effectively reduce pain.
Trigeminal Neuralgia
We offer a successful trigeminal neuralgia treatment using a single high dose of highly focused radiosurgery for medically refractory patients.
Launched by our team of radiation oncologists, neurologists, medical physicists, radiation therapists and neuroradiologists, this program offers relief of pain within one to two weeks following the treatment.