Applied neurophysiology
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Applied neurophysiology · Jan 1988
Lesions of spinal and trigeminal dorsal root entry zone for deafferentation pain. Experience of 35 cases.
Spinal and trigeminal dorsal root entry zone destruction (DREZ-tomy) was performed on 35 patients with deafferentation pain of various types. Overall, satisfactory pain relief was obtained in 65.5% of spinal DREZ-tomy cases in the follow-up observation. ⋯ Two patients with postherpetic trigeminal neuralgia were completely relieved of pain in the average follow-up period of 32 months, while in 2 patients with postrhizotomy facial pain, pain recurred 4 months after the operation in 1, and, in the other, pain in the medial part of the face remained unchanged. Complications were seen in about 60% of the patients, which were, however, all mild, except for 2 cases of death due to gastrointestinal disease.
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Applied neurophysiology · Jan 1988
Dorsal root entry zone lesions in the treatment of pain following brachial plexus avulsion, spinal cord injury and herpes zoster.
This paper details the long-term results in patients treated with dorsal root entry zone (DREZ) lesions for the treatment of pain following brachial plexus avulsion, spinal cord injury, and herpes zoster. With our current operative technique, 82% of patients with brachial plexus avulsion injuries were afforded long-term pain relief. Patients with pain confined to dermatomes just below the level of spinal injury also did well with DREZ lesions, although the results were less good in patients with diffuse pain or with sacral pain. The postoperative results in patients with postherpetic pain were disappointing.