One of the pitfalls of having facial paralysis is losing the ability to control your face and sleep normally at night with both of your eyes closed. Facial palsy patients often have abnormal looking features, and sometimes, they can't smile at all. That can be damaging to a patient's self-image. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are diagnosed with facial palsy each year.
NEW DEVICE: The Patterned Electrical Neuromuscular Stimulation (PENS) device is helping patients with facial paralysis, muscle tears, osteoarthritis, back and joint pain, neuropathy, carpal tunnel syndrome and pinched nerves. The PENS device is used in combination with other therapies to help patients regain their normal function. The device is placed on the back of the neck or anywhere where an abnormal muscle has electrical activity running through it. In an abnormal muscle, the balance is disturbed. The PENS device helps the muscle regain that balance. A therapist hooks up wires from the PENS device box directly to the facial muscles or the muscles in the body requiring electrical stimulation.
"For a person who has facial palsy, the muscle balance is returned. Facial palsy wasn't something that we thought about using the device with at first, but since we've been using it, some of our patients have been very pleased with their progress," Jodi Barth, a physical therapist at the National Rehabilitation Hospital's Olney and Montrose Outpatient Centers, told Ivanhoe. The device is now playing a role in therapy sessions for many different conditions. PENS replicates the normal nerve and muscle firing order that a person had before being injured or diseased. It reminds the muscles and nerves how they're supposed to work together, while managing pain and strengthening muscles.
For More Information, Contact:
Jodi Barth, PT
National Rehabilitation Hospital, Montrose Center
Rockville, MD
(301) 984-6594
