Sensibility threshold, mental health, and endocrine markers in patients with chronic orofacial pain.

Sensibility threshold, mental health, and plasma beta-endorphin, cortisol, and prolactin levels were studied in 15 patients suffering from chronic orofacial pain or discomfort, six of them with oral lichen planus and nine with atypical facial pain. Five patients were used as controls. The results showed a difference in mental health and sensibility threshold; the mentally more disturbed had a lower sensibility threshold. The patients suffering from chronic pain were more frequently mentally disturbed than the patients in the control group and also had a lower sensibility threshold than the controls. Neither severity of pain nor mental disturbance correlated with the endocrine markers.