Mahsa Etemadi - Dental Student, Students research committee, School of dentistry, Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran

Background and Objective: bell s palsy is an acute and self-limiting form of motor neuron paralysis and the most common cause of unilateral facial paralysis with sudden onset. The symptoms include numbness or tingling in the affected side of the face. Despite having any certain cause, viral or bacterial infections, vascular ischemia,… are known to be possible causes of bell’s palsy. Up until now physical therapy, corticosteroids and antivirals have been used as its treatment. Laser therapy is a physical, conservative and painless treatment which can be used for every patient. Considering the favorable outcomes of laser therapy in bell’s palsy, in this article an overview of the studies on the treatment of Bell s palsy by laser is presented .Search Method: Literature review was conducted by searching bell s palsy , therapy , laser in PubMed, google scholar, Scopus, embase and ISI web of science databases. Articles were identified as relevant by their titles. Final analysis led to 10 randomized clinical trials and 3 case reports .Finding: Using laser increases the amplitude of action potential and the number of axons and improves the quality of nerve regeneration. phototherapy with laser stimulates the metabolism of damaged neurons producing growth proteins which results in improving the facial nerve regeneration capacity. In all patients Ga-Al-As laser presented signs of neuron reconstruction. Recent studies have claimed anti-inflammatory, anti-swelling and analgesic effects for Nd:YAG laser which suggests using it as a treatment for pain and inflammation .Conclusion: Laser therapy has been effective in treating bell’s palsy as a new therapeutic approach, itself or in combination with other therapies, and has been shown to accelerate the recovery of patients in most cases .

Laser; laser therapy; bell s palsy