Pathological laughter in a patient with trigeminal neurinoma

Abstract

We present a 47-year-old woman with a long history of anxiety and a more recent history of shock-like facial pain and episodes of laughter without any motivation. She could not explain the laughing bursts and did not have a sense of mirth preceding it. On neurological examination she presented a VI nerve palsy and trigeminal hypoesthesia (V2 and V3) on the right side. Magnetic resonance imaging exhibited a large cystic lesion on the right middle fossa causing significant compression on the brain stem. A frontoorbitozygomatic and pretemporal combined approach was performed. During intra and extradural exploration a large tumor was found on the trigeminal nerve. The whole lesion was resected, revealing to be a neurinoma on pathological exhamination. She maintained a VI nerve palsy but had complete remission of the unmotivated laughing episodes during the one year follow up.