A successful surgery to liberate facial nerve, the first of its kind in Syria

A medical team at Al-Assad University Hospital in Damascus succeeded in performing a surgical operation for a 56-year-old woman, after three years of suffering from a chronic, disfiguring facial neurological disease that causes involuntary spastic movements such as recurrent eye closing with spasm and deviation of the mouth. This health condition led to the woman avoiding communication with the community and causing her depression during the past years.

Dr. Basil Al-Ramahin, a specialist in brain and neurosurgery, who supervised the medical team to perform the surgery, said in a statement to SANA: “The patient underwent brain surgery in the back hole near the brain stem to free the facial nerve responsible for the movement of most facial muscles from the pulsating effect of the artery that is pressing on it  continuously and causes these spasms.”

He added, “This surgery was performed completely endoscopically, and it is one of the very modern neurosurgery operations in the United States of America and Europe, and it is being successfully conducted for the first time in Syria.”

Al-Ramahin indicated that the patient is in an excellent clinical condition after the surgery with complete improvement of symptoms, noting that it is the first time that she can look happily in the mirror in three years and return to her normal life.

Al-Ramahin expressed his thanks to the hospital administration, the Neurosurgery Division, the anesthetic, surgical and nursing staff, and everyone who contributed to the success of this qualitative and distinguished surgical procedure.

Inas Abdulkareem