Frequency and Prognosis of delayed Facial Palsy after Facial Spasm surgeries

This is a simple introduction of the main hospital’s research that was printed on ‘Acta Neurochirurgica’ on August 2006 and the assessment of theses examiners.

The name of the thesis was ‘frequency and prognosis of delayed facial palsy after facial spasm surgeries’ and this is a quick summary.

In all the 410 patients that had surgery for facial spasm from February 1998 to April 2004, delayed facial palsy occurred in 21 of them (5.4%). Although the reason for delayed facial palsy has not been discovered in detail, it generally happened in about 1 to 2 weeks after surgery, and even though the intensity varied, most healed after 2 months.

The following are the assessment of the examiners.

This paper adds substantial data to many stories that neurosurgeons, involved with MVD for HFS, tell each other and patients, but without the hard facts at hand. The general feeling is that 5?10% has a delayed palsy, occurring between 7 and 14 days. Rhee et al. now give more exact data. The large experience of the authors, expressed by the high number of surgeries in a short period of time, makes their results interesting and reliable.

-J. J. A. Mooij (Groningen, Germany)

This well-documented paper from a very experienced team brings attention to a particular phenomenon that may be observed after Micro-Vascular Decompression for Hemifacial spasm (HFS)

-M. Sindou (Lyon, France)