Immediate lengthening temporalis myoplasty for facial palsy reconstruction following facial nerve inclusive total parotidectomy.

Immediate lengthening temporalis myoplasty (Labbe procedure) for immediate dynamic facial reanimation after nerve-inclusive parotidectomy in the elderly population is undocumented in the literature. The aim of this work was to determine whether the Labbe approach could achieve immediate, good functional and static results in elderly patients with acquired facial palsy. A retrospective analysis of five patients with parotid malignancies involving the facial nerve who underwent parotidectomy and an immediate Labbe procedure was performed. The House-Brackmann and Sunnybrook scores for facial palsy were used as objective measurements of the functional outcome. All patients underwent total parotidectomy, neck dissection, Labbe procedure, immediate temporary tarsorrhaphy, brow lift, and postoperative radiotherapy. Mean patient age was 83 (range 73-87) years. The average resected tumour size was 3.54 cm. The mean duration of surgery was 324 min and length of hospital stay 4 days. All patients experienced an improvement in House-Brackmann of one grade postoperative (grade V to IV in four, grade VI to V in one); the Sunnybrook score improved by 31 points on average (mean preoperative 3.8 vs postoperative 34.8). An immediate Labbe procedure following ablative parotid malignancy resection is a reliable and safe reconstructive procedure in a carefully selected elderly population, providing acceptable immediate static and dynamic hemifacial mimetic function and eliminating an additional facial palsy correction procedure.