Botox Injections for Chronic Pain

Did you know that botox can be effective at treating chronic pain conditions like TMJ, chronic migraines and tension headaches? When muscles in the jaw and face become tense due to stress, anxiety, or other factors, it can lead to symptoms such as jaw pain, difficulty chewing, clicking or popping noises in the jaw joint (TemporoMandibular Joint or TMJ), headaches, earaches, and even limited jaw movement. These symptoms are commonly associated with TMJ disorders.  

The same is true for the muscles in the neck and shoulders and forehead that can often lead to chronic headaches

HOW DO BOTOX INJECTIONS TREAT HEADACHES?

Botox is an excellent way of breaking the cycle of pain.  While it’s important to get to the root cause of the underlying stress, anxiety, and tension and rule out other causes of headaches like Lyme disease or other issues (which we also focus on at Blum Center for Health), sometimes you want to feel better right now.  Preventing Muscle Contraction with Botox is an evidence based approach and one way to do this.   

Botox works by temporarily paralyzing or weakening the muscles that are in spasm and causing pain. In the case of headaches, it can be injected into specific muscles in the head and neck to release the tension, and prevent them from again contracting excessively.  This can alleviate tension and reduce the frequency and severity of your headaches.

WHAT TO EXPECT WHEN RECEIVING BOTOX TREATMENTS? 

The procedure, depending on the location of your symptoms, involves multiple injections around the head and neck and/or jaw.  Because there are multiple injections into areas of trigger points, a common initial side effect can be soreness, which usually resolves within a day or two. 

Clinical trials have shown that Botox injections can be an effective treatment reducing the number of headache days per month for many patients and alleviating jaw pain and grinding. Because botox takes up to 2-3 weeks to take effect, it may take up to a month to start seeing the effects. 

IS BOTOX RIGHT FOR MY HEADACHES? 

Yes, if you suffer from any of these: 

  • chronic headaches, or 
  • have chronic pain in your jaw or TMJ 
  • Have chronic muscular pain in your head and neck 

While we don’t accept insurance, we will provide you with a form to submit to your insurance company. 

Botox injections will give you temporary relief from your pain – which is important! If you’re a current patient of Blum Center, message your provider in the patient portal for a referral for the treatment.  

If you’re new to Blum Center and are interested in Botox to treat your headaches, schedule a 30-minute consult with Dr Greenman.  

If discovering the root cause of your headaches is important to you,  Functional Medicine can help. Schedule an appointment with one of our clinicians for an in-depth medical assessment.