Typical Sites of Facial-Nerve Lesions

Abstract

In FORMER days, it was common practice in ear surgery to give the facial nerve as wide a berth as possible. Often, a young resident acted the role of a "facial nerve protector." His task was to report immediately the slightest facial twitch that occurred with the warning cry, "Attention: Facial Nerve!" More often than not, however, the damage was already done at that moment. Technical progress in otosurgery has reduced to a minimum the danger of iatrogenic damage to the facial nerve. It comes as a severe shock to both patient and surgeon when an operation that was meant to be curative results in a facial paralysis. I feel personally that a paper on the subject of facial paralysis should actually not be read by a European otologist. For it was in this country that experimental and clinical investigations led to the development of a systematic surgical procedure to