Self-reported symptoms of stress with temporomandibular disorders: comparisons to healthy men and women.

Replies on a self-report measure of symptoms of stress obtained from men and women patient samples with diagnosed temporomandibular disorders were compared with similar replies on this test obtained from healthy men and women. On most (six of 10) of the symptoms of stress subscales, the temporomandibular disorder patients' scores were elevated relative to the symptoms of stress averages of the healthy nonpatient samples. There were several statistically significant group differences. There were no statistically significant gender differences nor any gender group interactions. These data are seen as essentially supporting and extending prior studies, which have indicated that, on the average, temporomandibular disorder patients report more psychologic and somatic symptoms. Furthermore, current findings indicate that male temporomandibular disorder patients and female temporomandibular disorder patients report more numerous and/or frequent somatic, psychologic, and behavioral symptoms of stress compared with their healthy counterparts.