Otology & neurotology : official publication of the American Otological Society, American Neurotology Society [and] European Academy of Otology and Neurotology
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Multicenter Study
The management of peripheral facial nerve palsy: "paresis" versus "paralysis" and sources of ambiguity in study designs.
Conservative management of idiopathic or herpetic acute peripheral facial palsy (herpes zoster oticus, HZO) often leads to a favorable outcome. However, recent multicenter studies have challenged the necessity of antivirals. Whereas large numbers of patients are required to reveal statistical differences in a disease with an overall positive outcome, surprisingly few studies differentiate between patients with paresis and paralysis. Analyzing our own prospective cohort of patients and reviewing the current literature on conservative treatment of Bell's palsy and HZO, we reveal the importance of initial baseline assessment of the disease course to predict the outcome and to validate the impact of medical treatment options. STUDY DESIGN AND DATA SOURCE: Prospective analysis of consecutive patients referred to 2 tertiary referral centers and research on the Cochrane Library for current updates of their previous reviews and search of MEDLINE (1976-2009) for randomized trials on conservative treatment of acute facial palsy were conducted. ⋯ The time course for improvement and the extent of recovery is significantly different in patients presenting with an incomplete facial nerve paresis compared with patients with a total paralysis. Whereas the term "palsy" includes both entities, the term "paralysis" should only be used to describe total loss of nerve function. Patients with incomplete acute Bell's palsy (paresis) should start to improve their facial function early (1-2 wk after onset) and are expected to recover completely within 3 months. These patients do not benefit from antiviral medications and most likely do not profit from systemic steroids. Mixing patients with different severity of palsies will always lead to controversial results.
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In search of genes associated with vestibular schwannoma tumorigenesis, this study examines the gene expression in human vestibular nerve versus vestibular schwannoma tissue samples using microarray technology. ⋯ We conclude that a number of transcripts are deregulated in sporadic vestibular schwannomas, and that several of these have functional annotations implicated in tumorigenesis. Specifically, genes involved in extracellular matrix function, cell adhesion, and protein binding seem to be of potential importance. However, further studies using other methodologies are needed for verification of the observed changes of gene expression seen by cDNA microarray analyses, for example, reverse-transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction and protein analyses.
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To evaluate the predictive value of electromyographic recordings for the immediate facial nerve outcome after solitary vestibular schwannoma (VS) removal. ⋯ Using CM recording stimulation and supramaximal stimulation of the facial nerve in combination with thresholds seem to increase the predictive value of the monitoring for the immediate facial nerve function for VS surgery.