PERIPHERAL FACIAL PARALYSIS: BENEFIT OF EARLY TREATMENT, A RETROSPECTIVE STUDY ABOUT 47 CASES

Abstract

Introduction: Peripheral facial paralysis is a relatively common pathology which concerns both the general practitioner and the ENT specialist, the ophthalmologist, the neurologist and the pediatrician. The difficulty in therapeutic management lies in the lack of randomized and controlled studies. The functional and aesthetic after-effects can be the source of psychological suffering. Material and method: This is a retrospective study, carried out within the ENT and CCF department of the Avicenne Military Hospital in Marrakech over a period of 5 years from January 2016 to December 2020. Data collection was carried out from the medical records of 47 patients hospitalized in the department during the study period. The texts were entered using the MICROSOFT OFFICE WORD2007 software and the graphics were entered using the MICROSOFT OFFICE EXCEL 2007 software. Results: The age of our patients varied between 10 to 69 years, with a clear predominance of the age group of 45-60 years and an average age of 42 years, the majority of these patients, i.e. 87% were male. The monthly distribution showed a greater frequency in Winter. As for the antecedents, diabetes is the most common (34% of cases) followed by recurrence of PFP in 17% of cases. Regarding the severity diagnosis, the majority of our patients had stage IV (45% of our PFP). Although the etiologies are multiple, in our study, refrigerated PFs dethroned them with more than 68% of cases, followed by herpetic PFs which were recorded in 11% of cases. As for the pick-up time, it is 55.3% in the first three days, and fortunately so. The bases of therapy were corticosteroid therapy and facial physiotherapy. Regarding the evolution of our patients, 35 cases had a complete recovery, 9 patients had an incomplete recovery including 3 with synkinesias and spasms and 3 cases did not recover. Our results showed that this same good development is correlated with the precocity of treatment. Conclusion: PFPs are certainly often benign, they always require rapid and appropriate treatment. This pathology unfortunately causes functional, aesthetic and undoubtedly psychological after-effects requiring continuous long-term monitoring.