Outeome and management of Bell’s palsy among Sudanese patients in Khartoum state 2015

Abstract

Abstract Background: Bells palsy is the idiopathic seventh cranial nerve palsy. It is the most common cause of the abrupt onset of unilateral facial weakness. Although the natural history of Bell’s palsy is encouraging for most of the patients since a total recovery of facial fimction is expected, nevertheless additional long term poor outcomes do occur in minority of them and can be devastating. Bel1’s palsy is diagnosed when no other medical etiology is identified as a cause of the facial weakness. Hence the overall objective of the study was to measure the outcome management of Bell’s palsy in Sudanese patients and compare it with the other countries. Methodology: Cross sectional rnulticenter based study. It was conducted in most Khartoum state physiotherapy centers (three in hospital and seven in private sectors) during July - November 2015. The sample size was 70 cases of Bel1’s palsy. The cases that fulfilled the inclusion criteria were collected by a method of total coverage during the working hours. Well constructed questionnaires were filled during the interview by a trained physiotherapist. The collected data was then analyzed using SPSS sofiware program, version 20. Results: The result showed that the statistically significant factors with p value less than 0.05 are: the association between age and patient improvement,the association between grade of Bell’s palsy before and afier management and the effect of physiotherapy

sessions fi'om three to seven in one week on patient improvement. In contrast to the other factors to which the study failed to reveal their statistical significance with p value more than 0.05 arezassociation between initiation of medications and physiotherapy in the first week wifli patient improvement. Conclusion: The study concluded that, the statistical significant factor is eficct of physiotherapy sessions on the improvement of the patient. and statistical non-significant factor is relation between initiation of medications and physiotherapy in the first week with patient improvement