Introduction: The term 'painful tic convulsive' is used to describe the syndrome involving concomitant hemifacial spasm and ipsilateral trigeminal neuralgia. Vascular compression of the fifth and seventh cranial nerves is the most common cause, involving the entry and exit zone of rootlets coming from the brainstem; nevertheless, different etiologies of this syndrome has been previously reported. Treatment for this disease is based on surgical microvascular decompression of the nerve rootlets, but still a topic of debate.
Case report: A 63-year-old woman with history of 14 years presenting left trigeminal neuralgia, associated with ipsilateral hemifacial spasm for more than ten years. Medical treatment was installed without adequate symptom control. Patient was subjected to surgical treatment via a microasterional approach, with dissection of arachnoid fibrous tissue surrounding fifth and seventh nerves during the first surgery. A second surgery was performed with insertion of a teflon fragment aside of each exit nerve root (V and VII-VIII complex). Symptoms resolved immediately after the surgery and has persisted during the 1-year follow-up. Painful tic convulsive etiology could be multifactorial.
Conclusion: This report is the first clinical case describing basal arachnoiditis as a primary cause of painful tic convulsive.
Title: Presentacion inusual de un tic convulsivo doloroso.
Introduccion. La presentacion clinica de un espasmo hemifacial asociado a neuralgia trigeminal ipsilateral se conoce como tic convulsivo doloroso. La causa mas comun de esta patologia es la compresion vascular de los nervios craneales V y complejo VII-VIII en la zona de entrada y salida de las raices en el tronco del encefalo, pero existen informes de diversas etiologias. Su tratamiento, aunque aun esta en discusion, se basa en la descompresion microvascular quirurgica. Caso clinico. Mujer de 63 años, con un cuadro de evolucion de 14 años de neuralgia trigeminal, con predominio en distribucion de la rama maxilar (V2) izquierda, asociado durante mas de 10 años a espasmo hemifacial ipsilateral. Tras fallar el tratamiento medico, se sometio a cirugia por abordaje microasterional, y en un primer momento se realizo una diseccion de adherencias aracnoideas firmes rodeando complejos nerviosos. En un segundo tiempo quirurgico se insertaron fragmentos de teflon en los sitios de entrada de los nervios V y complejo VII-VIII, y se logro una resolucion completa de la sintomatologia durante mas de un año. Conclusion. La etiologia del tic convulsivo doloroso en esta paciente fue aracnoiditis basal, lo cual la convierte en el unico caso comunicado hasta el momento con dicha etiologia.