FACIAL PARALYSIS: A CLINICAL STUDY OF 580 CASES

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Abstract
A study of the patients presenting to the Physical Medicine Department of Alexandria University Hospital with facial paralysis was made over one year. The occurrence of the disease was compared with similar data obtained from Cairo University Hospital and the Royal Free Hospital, London, as well as with other studies in the literature. Bell's palsy was found to have a higher occurrence rate in Alexandria than in Cairo, and much more so than in London. It constituted the biggest group treated at the above-mentioned department. Bell's palsy was found to start to increase in August, reaching its highest occurrence in December, and then to decline. The morbidity rate paralleled population distribution in different districts. The disease was found to occur most often in the first two decades, and females were affected significantly more often than males. Both sides of the face were affected equally. The disease was recurrent in almost one-tenth of the cases, and females had twice as many recurrences. Theories of the aetiology of Bell's palsy are discussed, and the results of this study support an infective theory, either a specific infective neuritis or spread of inflammation to the Fallopian canal from non-suppurative otitis media. Evidence is offered against cold or vascular insufficiency playing any important role in the pathogenesis of the disase.

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