Neuralgia

Neuralgia, pain occurring in the course of a nerve (the term is derived from two Greek words signifying "nerve-pain"). Neuralgia may be due to injury of a nerve, or to its involvement by disease affecting parts adjacent to it, as in caries of the spine, hip-joint disease, etc. The common forms of neuralgia are those which occur in association with anaemia and hysteria. The subjects of malarial disease occasionally suffer from severe neuralgia. The symptoms are pains of a paroxysmal character occurring in the course of distribution of a nerve. There is sometimes some loss of sensation (anaesthesia), and usually tenderness on pressure (hyper There are often, moreover, certain definite painful spots, the situation of these being dependent upon the particular nerve involved. In facial neuralgia, for example, the points of emergence of the three branches of the fifth cranial nerve from the bony skull are particularly noteworthy as being such painful spots. Again, in intercostal neuralgia and in sciatica there are definite spots which are painful on pressure. A variety of neuralgia usually affecting the fifth nerve is known as tic douloureux. This disease is happily very rare; the pain is intense, and is accompanied by spasmodic contraction of muscles, whence the term epileptiform, neuralgia, which is sometimes applied to it.