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This study of temporomandibular disorder (TMD) treatment outcomes examines 274 consecutive patients in five diagnostic categories and a 25 patient comparison group to determine relative levels of symptom improvement. Employing a psychometric outcome measure, the TMJ Scale, it was found that patients receiving active TMD treatments manifest statistically significant symptom improvements. Untreated patients reported minor and statistically insignificant symptom variations. Patients with intracapsular TM joint dysfunctions exhibited higher levels of improvement in pain and other TMD symptoms than patients presenting with primarily muscle symptoms. This research supports the hypothesis that TMDs are not self-limiting and require active treatment interventions. It is suggested that some studies cited to show that TMDs are self-limiting have major methodological limitations, relying upon unvalidated and subjective assessments of symptom levels. This research also outlines a procedure for TMD practitioners to measure treatment efficacy and the relative effectiveness of differing treatment modalities in a valid, consistent and unbiased manner.

This study measures the effects of treatment interventions on two classes of temporomandibular disorder (TMD) patients in a dental practice in Ottawa, Canada. Other studies of TMD treatment outcome have employed subjective, largely qualitative and nonquantitative measures of symptom levels to make this type of assessment, rendering such research largely incapable of being replicated. The current study employs the TMJ Scale, a validated and psychometrically-developed symptom inventory, to measure symptom levels before and after treatment. The study first determined the sensitivity (92.1%) and specificity (88.1%) of the TMJ Scale for 219 patients in the practice population. One hundred and eleven consecutive TMD patients completed TMJ Scales prior to treatment, and then were retested after the completion of treatment. Results indicate that patients with symptoms of internal joint derangement reported more symptomatic improvement than those with predominantly muscular symptomology, despite the fact that the latter manifested lower symptom levels initially. Patients with internal derangement symptoms initially presented with lower levels of psychological symptoms than patients with muscular symptoms. Substantial improvements in both groups were noted, employing TMJ Scale percentile rank changes as outcome measures. This study can serve as a model for future research toward establishing baselines for expected TMD symptom improvement.