| Research BackgroundFacial paralysis refers to a sort of disease marked by the deviation of the mouth and eyes to the unilateral side and with major symptoms of sudden facial numbness, facial muscular flaccidity in the affected side and deviation of the mouth and eyes to the healthy side. It is attributed to peripheral facial paralysis in modern medicine. Bell's palsy is the most commonly-encountered peripheral facial paralysis. Based on epidemiology survey, it is found that Bell's palsy is not distinctly seasonal, but the incidence of this disease is relatively low in summer; the age of high incidence ranges from 15-45, the mean age being 40-44 years old and the patients with less than 15 and more than 60 years old hardly found; the prevalence rate has no significant differences, whereas the occurrence of the disease in female is slightly higher than in male; There are no conspicuous differences between the right and left sides. This disease without harm to the body brings extreme anxiety to the patients in that patients are shameful to go out, affecting work and communication. In addition,10%-25% of patients undergo functional disorders of the facial nerve to varying degrees, serious ones resulting in disfigurement, which brings great psychological and physiological burden to patients. At present, modern medicine has no specific medicine to treat, but traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) for treating facial paralysis has long history. A lot of classic medical books contain the statement and treatment on facial paralysis, in which acupuncture and moxibustion therapy of facial paralysis with the history of more than 2000 years is still one of major ways to treat facial paralysis in TCM. The commonly-used methods include acupuncture, moxibustion, ironing, external application of drugs and so on. Various kinds of acupuncture and moxibustion methods like electroaupuncture, point injection, comprehensive therapy and so forth enriched in recent times have better therapeutic effects and are widely applied into clinical practice.ObjectivesThe randomized controlled single-blinded method was applied to study the instructional significance of acupuncturing Hegu in treating Bell's palsy and provide clinical evidence for the classic verse stated that diseases of the face and mouth apply Hegu.MethodsThe randomized controlled single-blinded clinical trial was selected to study and 60 patients conforming to the standards of Bell's palsy were considered as study subjects. According to the proportion of one to one, the patients were randomly divided into two groups:treatment group and control group. Acupuncture method, being the fundamental treatment, was adopted in both groups (Yangbai (GB 14), Sibai (ST 2), Quanliao (ST 18), Jiache (ST 6), Dicang (ST 4), Yifeng (SJ 17)). Acupuncturing bilateral Hegu (LI 4) was added in the treatment group while bilateral Jingtong point added in the control group. Besides, House-Brackmann facial nerve functional evaluation hierarchical system and the questionnaire of facial deformity indexes (FDI) were as evaluation indexes at the time of accepting, after two courses of treatment and at the time of finishing the treatment. Adverse reactions and side effects were recorded at any time during the research process. Statistical software SPSS13.0 was adopted to analyze the collected data.ResultThe constituent ratios of gender, affected side, age and course of disease couldn't be found different with statistical significance between the two groups. The patients'House-Brackmann and the FDIP score were also incomparable (P>0.05). FDI score is including physical function score FDIP and features of social life score FDIS. After the treatment, The patients' H-B and the FDIP score were comparable (P<0.05). In the curative effect, there is significance difference between 2 groups (P<0.05). NO differences in FDIS was found between the two groups according to P>0.05. Conclusion1.Acupuncture therapy, a sort of effective therapy for treating Bell's palsy, has definite and positive efficacy when the course of treatment finishes.2. Compared with selecting local points, adding the acupuncture of bilateral Hegu has enhanced effects on the treatment of Bell's palsy.3. Acupuncture therapy is reliable and safe for treating Bell's palsy. Its incidence of side effects and adverse reactions are extremely low.
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