Common causes of nondental facial pain.

General dentists often are among the first to be consulted when a patient experiences facial pain. Frequently, the cause is obvious. However, there are cases in which the etiological factor is not so evident. Often, in an attempt to help relieve a patient of pain and suffering, irreversible, invasive procedures are undertaken that prove only to increase the patient's pain and the practitioner's frustration. Three common pain syndromes that may be confused with odontogenic pain are discussed: temporal tendinitis, Ernest syndrome, and atypical trigeminal neuralgia. The symptoms, diagnostic procedures, and treatments for all three disorders are presented, as is a newly described muscle, the zygomandibularis.