Objective:

Arthrocentesis is an important step therapy in the treatment of temporomandibular joint disorders. It is important to determine the efficacy of this method based on the principle of removing inflammatory mediators from the joint space.

Material and Methods:

Arthrocentesis was performed in 77 patients who had TME complaints between 2011-2015. Each joint was lavaged with approximately 300 ml of ringer lactate by the double-needle method. All patients were evaluated with VAS (Visual analogue scale) for pain; with interinsisional distance measurement for function and MR (magnetic resonance) imaging for disc pathologies. Patient data were collected and evaluated at 3 months after the procedure using the same parameters.

Results:

In all patients, there was a decrease in the amount of VAS after the procedure, and all the patients except one patient showed improvement in joint functions. No significant change was observed about disk position in MR images.

Conclusion:

In this study, we tried to reveal the efficacy of arthrocentesis that we applied in a large series of patients with numeric datas. TME arthrocentesis is a less complicated procedure that does not require additional equipment and is easy to perform. It is a minimally invasive method that is effective in reducing pain of TMD and restoring function.

Keywords: temporomandibular joint, temporomandibular joint disorders, temporomandibular joint disc