[Diagnostic and prognostic value of electrophysiologic studies in patients with peripheral paralysis of the facial nerve].

An analysis of the period and degree of restitution of the functions of mimical muscles in peripheral paralysis of the facial nerve depending upon changes of the motor and reflectory responses of the orbicular muscle of the eye, the type of changes in the main curves of electroexcitation and the development of all these changes during the first 3 weeks of the disease served as a basis for the determination of an early diagnosis and the level of facial nerve lesions. The study revealed an increase of the latent period of motor and reflex responses of the orbicular eye muscles testifies to disturbances of the myeline structures of the facial nerve. The authors suggest that a low electroexcitability of the stem of the facial nerve is associated not so much with the axonal degeneration, as with the process of demyelinization.