Treatment of prolonged facial paralysis with temporalis myoplasty and electrical stimulation [Uzam??̧ Fasiyal Paralizi'de Temporal Miyoplasti ve Elektrik Stimülasyon Tedavisi]

Objectives: the study goal was to determine whether electrical stimulation (es) with subthreshold,continuous,low-frequency impulses is a viable clinical method for improving functional recovery after aplication of temporalis muscle transfer technique operation. material and methods: eighteen patients between 15-69 years of age were selected from the patients were operated between july 2000 and july 2004. postoperatively the patients were divided into three groups according to the electrical physiotherapy regime. as electrical stimulation we used faradic current with 100 hz frequency in both stimulation group as a programme,7 min stimulation and 3 min resting total 10 min had been performed (20 min/day,21 times days total). aesthetic outcome (dynamic and static evaluation),life quailty evaluation short form 36 (sf 36),electromyography (emg),photos and video records were used in the evaluation. results: in the visual evaluation of dynamic and static symetry es group had the best results which was very close to the health side. es group had the best results in the life quality evauation test. in the emg analysis es group had the closest results to the healthy facial muscles. conclusions: our technique endows dynamic symmetry,educating the temporal muscle with electrical stimulation is one of the best treatment in the prolonged facial paralysis.