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Statement by NIDCR Acting Director on the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Report on Temporomandibular Joint Disorders

I am pleased to announce the release of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) report, Temporomandibular Disorders: Priorities for Research and Care. As underscored by the comprehensive report, temporomandibular joint disorders (TMJDs) are a diverse and still poorly understood set of complex, painful conditions affecting the jaw muscles and tissues, temporomandibular joints, and associated nerves. Clearly, there is much more to be understood, and these conditions continue to confound medical and dental health care providers and researchers.

New Report on Temporomandibular Disorders: Priorities for Research and Care

With support from the Office of the Director of the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine appointed a committee to address the current state of knowledge regarding TMD research, education and training, safety and efficacy of clinical treatments, and associated burden and costs.

Have you seen the film Dark Waters?

The Film. Dark Waters is about attorney Robert Billott's real-life 20 year legal battle against DuPont chemical for releasing toxic waste - perfluorooctanoic acid, or PFOA - into Parkersburg, West Virginia's water supply, with devastating health effects on the townspeople and livestock. PFOA, also known as C8, is a man-made chemical. It is used in the process of making Teflon and similar chemicals known as fluorotelomers.

Online TMD Diet Diary Research Project

Online TMD Diet Diary Research Project The TMJ Association received the following request from Professor Justin Durham and his research team at Newcastle University. We encourage TMJ patients to participate in this project as it is an under researched

Drug Induced Bruxism

The authors of this article state that orofacial movement disorders (bruxism) are treated typically by dental professionals and not by those specialists (neurologists) researching and treating the other movement disorders (Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, tremors, etc.). Again, this is more evidence of the complexity of TMD and the need for multidisciplinary research and treatment in TMD.

NIH Workshop Focused on TMD and Overlapping Conditions

  • Jan 27, 2017

The focus of The TMJ Association's (TMJA) last three scientific meetings has been on Temporomandibular Disorders (TMD) and pain conditions that a patient might get before or after being diagnosed with TMD. The recommendations from these meetings and advocacy action by members of the Chronic Pain Research Alliance (CPRA) have prompted the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to form a  trans-NIH committee to address these conditions. On August 13-14, 2012 the trans-NIH committee sponsored A Workshop on Chronic Overlapping Pain Conditions, at the NIH campus in Bethesda, Maryland. The meeting was open to the research community.

TMJA President, Terrie Cowley, and the other members of the CPRA participated in the panel discussions addressing patients' concerns regarding the state of diagnosis and treatments of these conditions as well as research directions to advance understanding of these complex disorders. Conditions addressed at the workshop include chronic fatigue syndrome, chronic headache, endometriosis, fibromyalgia, interstitial cystitis, irritable bowel syndrome, low back pain, Temporomandibular Disorders, and vulvodynia.

The goals of the workshop were to:

  1. Determine the state-of-the-science in chronic overlapping pain conditions;
  2. Develop a coordinated research strategy in order to identify standard features of chronic overlapping conditions that will drive the development of research diagnostic criteria;
  3. Improve and develop new research strategies to identify underlying mechanisms of etiology; trajectories of disease; risk factors for disease onset, progression and reversal; and outcome measures for these conditions.

We will share the formal workshop recommendations with you when we receive them.

TMJ Disorders

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In Treating TMJ

To view or order a free booklet about TMJ Disorders, visit the National Institutes of Health website.

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National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research
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