2020 Volume 41 Issue 1 Pages 64-69
We encountered a case of facial palsy in a 6-month-old infant. In Japan, the Yanagihara method is generally used for the evaluation of facial palsy. However, evaluation of facial palsy in infants by this method is difficult because of their non-compliance toward instructions. Therefore, the patient’s condition was assessed using the 10 points of triage method, which is reportedly useful to evaluate facial palsy in infants. In this method, the outcome measures are limited to three items—“wrinkling forehead,” “strong eye closure,” and “showing one’s teeth as if enunciating the sound, ‘ii!’ ” The difference between the speeds of the right and left motions can be easily captured by repeating the same motions multiple times if children are old enough to comply with instructions. However, because infants can hardly follow instructions to repeat the same motions, the difference between the speeds of the right ang left motions must be measured at a single motion correctly. Thus, naked eye observation alone often cannot capture the difference. To overcome this problem, video recording of the movements that mimic muscles and subsequent slow-motion examination of the movements by replaying the video was found useful.
