What is Bell's Palsy?

The chief complaint that you would hear most of the time would be "one side of my child's face does not seem to be moving, this is more noticeable when he cries, laughs or screams". The child will be unable to close the eye on the affected side and the corner of the mouth will droop. This is considered a common disorder in infancy to adolescence. Taste on the front of the tongue might be lost but there should be no numbness to the area. The most important thing you want to prevent is dryness of the affected are which will result in keratitis. Your doctor will prescribe some eye drops to prevent this from happening. The facial nerve on the affected side is considered to be swollen thus this symptoms appear.

The most common reason for this palsy is that the child had some type of viral infection approximately 2 weeks prior to the event. Most common cause is the Epstein-Barr virus, Lyme disease (you usually see this in the Northeast area), herpesvirus and mumps virus. This has excellent prognosis because 85% will resolve completely without residuals, 10% with very mild residual weakness and only 5% are left with severe facial weakness.

Steroids do not induce remission and is not recommended but since the pathophysiology is swelling of the facial nerve some people think that this might help a little bit. If palsy seems to be chronic or persistent you need to consider other facial nerve tumors that can impinge on the nerve to present with the symptoms. Physical therapy might help a little bit in the recovery process.