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DOI: 10.1055/s-0044-1789197
Is There an Association between Bell Palsy in Pediatric Patients and COVID-19?
Funding The authors declare that they did not receive funding from agencies in the public, private or non-profit sectors to conduct the present study.
Abstract
Introduction Bell palsy (BP) is an acquired, idiopathic facial palsy linked to lower motor neuron malfunction of the seventh cranial nerve. Several studies have identified BP as one of the many neuropathies that coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients have developed, while other studies disagree.
Objective To study if there is an association between BP in pediatric patients and COVID-19, and to examine the pattern of recovery in all pediatric cases of BP during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Methods We performed a prospective cohort study on pediatric patients with acute onset unilateral facial weakness of unknown etiology (BP) during the pandemic period. All included patients were submitted to a reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) test through nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) at the time of the BP diagnosis.
Results No significant differences were found regarding COVID-19 infection and recovery from BP at the first, third, or sixth months of follow-up. According to the results, it seems that there is no association between COVID-19 infection and facial palsy; however, the patients infected with COVID-19 in the sample experienced a rapid, early recovery from BP. The mean incidence of BP in 5 years (2017–2021) was of 1.73/100 thousand individuals, with a statistically insignificant change throughout the years.
Conclusion We were not able to show any association between BP and COVID-19. The patients underwent follow-up for up to 6 months, and we studied their patterns of recovery from BP, which were like those observed before the pandemic.
Ethical Approval
All procedures involving human participants in the present study followed the ethical standards of the institutional research editorial boards and the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.
Consent to Participate
Explanations were given, and informed written consent was obtained from the parents of the included patients.
Consent for Publication
Formal consent was provided by the parents of the included patients to share and publish their data in the present study.
Availability of Data and Materials
The datasets used and/or analyzed in the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
Authors' Contributions
MD: final revision, methodology, and data collection; SZ: methodology and the idea to perform the study; AS: data collection, review, writing and editing of the final draft; SE: data collection and revision; AG: data collection; and AS: methodology and final revision.
Publication History
Received: 19 June 2023
Accepted: 30 June 2024
Article published online:
23 January 2025
© 2025. The Author(s). This is an open access article published by Thieme under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, permitting copying and reproduction so long as the original work is given appropriate credit (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
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Mohamed E. El-Deeb, Saad Elzayat, Abeer Salamah, Ali Gamal, Shimaa Elgamal, Ahmed El-Sobki. Is There an Association between Bell Palsy in Pediatric Patients and COVID-19?. Int Arch Otorhinolaryngol 2025; 29: s00441789197.
DOI: 10.1055/s-0044-1789197