Journal
PHOTONICS
Volume 8, Issue 8, Pages -Publisher
MDPI
DOI: 10.3390/photonics8080341
Keywords
facial nerve; facial paralysis; idiopathic facial palsy; chronic pain; low-level laser therapy; light therapy; alternative cure; inflammation; tissue regeneration
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The study investigated the efficacy of photobiomodulation therapy in treating Bell's palsy patients who did not respond to standard treatment. Results showed that PBM therapy could be a supportive therapy for managing Bell's palsy in non-responsive patients, especially those with shorter duration of the condition. Randomized controlled trials are needed to further confirm these findings and explore the boundary between diagnosis time and recovery with PBM therapy.
Diminished facial movement and marked facial asymmetry can lead to a consistent psychological burden. Bell ' s palsy (BP) is one of the most common causes of facial nerve illness, which comes with unilateral acute facial paresis. Nowadays, no clear guidelines for treating BP are available. We carried out a case series study to test the efficacy of photobiomodulation (PBM) therapy in patients with BP non-responsive to standard treatment. The study was experimentally performed at the Department of Surgical and Diagnostic Sciences, University of Genoa (Genoa, Italy), in accordance with case report guidelines. Patients were referred to our department by colleagues for evaluation to be included in the case series because no consistent improvement was observed at least 3 months from the diagnosis of BP. All the patients interrupted their pharmacological therapy before the initiation of PBM therapy. PBM therapy (808 nm, 1 W irradiated in continuous-wave for 60 s on spot-size 1 cm(2); 1 W/cm(2); 60 J/cm(2); and 60 J) was administered every 2 days until complete resolution. Evaluation of the House-Brackmann scale was performed before and after treatments. Fourteen patients were screened as eligible for the study. Patients were Caucasians (36% females and 64% males) with a mean age +/- standard deviation of 56.07 +/- 15.21 years. Eleven patients out of 14, who experienced BP a maximum of 6 months, completely recovered through PBM. The three patients that did not show improvement were those who had experienced BP for years. PBM could be a supportive therapy for the management of BP in patients non-responsive to standard treatment. However, randomized controlled trials are necessary to sustain our encouraging results, exclude bias, and better explain the boundary between the time from diagnosis and the recovery of BP through PBM therapy.
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