Cinthia A Martins and Dov C Goldenberg
Trismus can be defined as mouth opening limitation and can be caused by some factors as edema following surgery, pain, invasion of the masticatory muscles and usually radiotherapy-induced fibrosis. Actually, there are some studies about trismus, but there are no uniform criteria about normal opening mouth and limited opening mouth. The negative impact in the quality life of these patients is very recognized, affecting daily activities such as phonation, chewing and oral health. This article proposes a short review of the literature on limitation of mouth opening, emphasizing the existing difficulties for the accurate diagnosis of this condition. The lack of uniform criteria for trismus diagnosis needs to be further studied through future research.
