Hi Trish,
I have both PN and RSD. I get tingling in all the areas that you said except for down my sides. When I first saw a neurologist and told him I had numbness around my mouth he said he thoughts maybe I was getting anxious about what I was going through. Then when I had positive testing for neuropathy he said it is a symtom of neuropathy. Sorry to hear your going through this. If it continues let your doctor know maybe meds need to be adjusted or added.
hopeful

Besides anxiety... tingling/numbness around the mouth is
can be sign of electrolyte disturbances.

Low Calcium for example.
http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec12/ch155/ch155b.html

Interesting. Every time I go to see a new neuro or doc and I tell them my lips, chin and sometimes the back of my head tingles they say that's not neuropathy but never pursue it further.

Hi everyone,
I also have facial tingling/numbness at times. I feel it most often in my chin, but, at times, have felt it in my cheeks, forehead and scalp. My symptoms began approximately 18 months ago with tingling/numbness in my feet. About 6 months later I began to have symptoms in my hands. Unfortunately, during the last 2 months, the tingling/numbness has begun to affect my entire legs, forearms/hands, my abdomen, buttocks and facial areas. Other than my lower legs and feet my symptoms seem to vary in their intensity day-to-day. Based on my EMG and physical exam, I've been diagnosed with sensory neuronopathy. Unfortunately, thus far, they've been unable to determine the cause. Except for testing for celiac disease (which I hope to be tested for shortly), I've had all the appropriate lab work with no significant findings. Since my labs for Sjogrens were negative, I may be having a lip biopsy for further evaluation. Anyway, at least in my case, the facial symptoms are part of the whole neuropathy/neuronopathy picture. The neurologist indicated that it is affecting all my nerves, since it is presumed that, based on my EMG/symptoms, that the problem lies at the level of the dorsal root ganglia. Enough about me...I didn't mean to "hijack" the thread. I hope that info. might help...

My docs say its part of my PN, and also recent very invasive dental surgerymade it worse... the nerves took a real hit.

Thank you all for letting me know you have experience this too.

--which is that far too many doctors who should know better, including neurologists, dismiss symptoms that aren't in the hands and feet as not being a possible peripheral neuropathy--they tend to think it's spinally related (if they think it's present at all--too many dismiss it as stress or anxiety).

But "peripheral" means any nerve outside the brain or spinal cord, and there are plenty of those in the trunk, the face/head, the neck . . .and while many length-dependent neuropathies may first present in the feet and hands--the nerves farthest from the body core--not all neuropathies work that way. Indeed, many toxic or acute or autoimmune neuropathies may be more global, as may many ganglionopathies/neuronopathies, that, as has been mentioned, involve processes in the dorsal root ganglia.

One often needs to print out something from a site like the Washington University Neuromuscular database just to show clinicians that these entities exist and are recognized--but good luck getting some of these people to look at them.