To investigate the effect of percutaneous balloon compression (PBC) in the treatment of neoplastic trigeminal neuralgia (TN).

The clinical data of 72 patients with secondary TN treated with PBC in the Department of Neurosurgery of The People’s Hospital of Liaoning Province from January 2005 to May 2017 were retrospectively analyzed, and the short-term and long-term pain control and complications were evaluated.

In the short-term, the clinical outcomes were 69 complete pain-free and 3 partial pain-free, and the complications mainly included facial numbness 63 cases, decreased corneal reflex 7 cases, paresthesia but tolerable 2 cases, cerebral spinal fluid leakage 1 case, keratitis 1 case and herpes 2 cases. The median length of clinical follow-up was 72.1 months (range 10-162 months). Forty patients had follow-up information, of which 2 patients died. In the long-term, 28 patients were complete pain-free, 5 patients partial pain-free and 5 patients recurred. The complications contained facial numbness in 19 patients, 7 of whom had no significant change compared with postoperative, 12 of whom had markedly reduced or local numbness, cerebral spinal fluid leakage in 1 patient, who was better than before and fewer fluid flowed occasionally, paresthesia and intolerable in 1 patient.

PBC is a simple, safe and effective method to relieve TN. For some neoplastic TN patients, it can play a benefical supplement for craniotomy.