Muscle relaxants in the treatment of myofascial face pain. A literature review

Among the different pharmacological approaches that could be adopted in the
treatment of myofascial pain of masticatory muscles, attention has to be paid to
muscle relaxants drugs, since very few studies evaluated their efficacy, despite
most authors suggest their use. The present paper is a critical review of the
literature on the use of the most common drugs with muscle relaxant effects
(benzodiazepines, tricyclic antidepressants) and of a muscle relaxant drug
(tizanidine hydrochloride) in the treatment of such condition. From literature
data it emerged that these drugs had phases of alternate enthusiasm,
characterized by a not constant clinical use and a fair interest in research.
Nevertheless, within all the limitations that have been discussed in this paper,
the use of muscle relaxants in patients with myofascial pain of masticatory
muscles seems to be justifiable, even though further research is needed to verify
their usefulness in terms of risk-benefit ratio.