Abstract
There have been reports on cases of concomitant mandibular and head movements during mastication and tooth tapping. In a previous report, we evaluated that normal healthy subjects had functional coupling between the head and mandibular movements during tooth tapping. However, little is known about the co-ordination of mandibular and head movements for patients with temporomandibular disorders. The objective of this study was to determine whether TMD patients had head movements accompanying jaw tapping. The results were as follows:
1. Some patients had head movements accompanying jaw tapping the same as healthy subjects, others had non-concomitant head movements with jaw tapping.
2. The incidence rate of concomitant head movement was 96.7% in the control group and 74.3% in the patients group.
3. The incidence rate in the patients group with limitation of mouth opening was 54.8%, which was less than those of the other symptom groups.
