The aim of this study was to compare clinical characteristics, electroneurography (ENoG) results, and functional outcomes of patients with Bell's palsy (BP) and Ramsay Hunt syndrome (RHS).Around 57 patients with BP and 23 patients with RHS were enrolled in this study from January 2010 and September 2015. Both clinical characteristics and ENoG results were recorded at hospital admission. The evaluations of functional outcomes were conducted with House–Brackmann (H-B) grading system at 6-month follow-up.There were no significant differences in age, gender proportion, initial H-B grades, time before commencement of treatment and the presence of comorbid disease in 2 groups. However, the final H-B grades at 6-month follow-up were significantly better in BP patients than RHS patients. The results of ENoG showed that degeneration index (DI) was significantly higher in the RHS group than the BP group. But no significant difference was found in the value of prolonged latency time (PLT) between the 2 groups. In multivariate analysis, age and ENoG DI were independently associated with functional outcome of recovery in the BP group (OR 0.167, 95% CI 0.038–0.622, P = 0.009 and OR 0.289 95% CI 0.107–0.998, P = 0.050, respectively). However, in the RHS group, only ENoG DI was related to the final H-B grades (OR 0.067, 95% CI 0.005–0.882, P = 0.040). Spearman's rank correlation analysis showed that higher age and ENoG DI were related to poorer prognosis in 2 groups (P < 0.05). PLT was related to functional outcomes only in the BP group (rs = 0.460, P < 0.001). The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) of ENoG DI analysis revealed that the cutoff value was 67.0% for BP prognosis and 64.5% for RHS prognosis. What's more, patients with hypertension or diabetes mellitus had both higher final H-B grade and ENoG DI than those without the same comorbidity.Patients with RHS had poorer prognosis than those with BP. Some factors including age, ENoG DI, and the presence of disease influenced recovery from BP and RHS. The present study demonstrated that BP patients with ENoG DI < 67.0% and RHS patients with ENoG DI < 65.5% had a greater opportunity for recovery within half a year.

Melkersson-Rosenthal syndrome (MRS) is an uncommon, complex neuromucocutaneous disorder characterized by recurrent orofacial oedema, facial palsy and fissured tongue. Complete MRS is uncommon. A case of complete MRS with multiple cranial nerve palsies is reported.

To assess the value of bulbocavernosus reflex (BCR) and pudendal nerve somatosensory-evoked potential (SSEP) in the topical diagnosis of central and peripheral nervous system diseases in female patients. Neuroelectrophysiologic technique was adopted to determine both BCR and SSEP of 41 healthy adult females (control group), 30 female patients with spinal cord lesions (central group), and 50 female patients with peripheral nerve lesions (peripheral group), including nine female patients with acute cauda equina syndrome. The abnormality rates of BCR were 8.33% and 70.00% in the central group and the peripheral group, respectively, and there were statistical differences between the two groups. The abnormality rates of BCR were 72.22% in the patients with acute cauda equina syndrome abnormal, who have at least one side of the abnormal BCR. The abnormality rates of SSEP P41 were 86.67% and 82.00% in the control and peripheral groups, respectively, and there were no statistical differences between the two groups. The abnormality rates of SSEP P41 were 88.89% in the patients with acute cauda equina syndrome abnormal. Also, there were no statistical differences between the peripheral group and the patients with acute cauda equina syndrome in the abnormality rates of SSEP or BCR. Both BCR and SSEP changed in the peripheral group, especially in the patients with acute cauda equina syndrome, but only SSEP changed in the central group. BCR and SSEP are valuable in the topical diagnosis of nervous system diseases in females.

Considered in this paper is the large deflection of a thin beam. One end of the beam is fixed (clamped) to a rigid wall, while the other end is placed on a flat surface of arbitrary orientation. Under the assumption that the axial deformation of the neutral axis is negligible, a closed form analytical solution to the deflection curve is obtained in terms of elliptical functions. The analytical solution is shown to have certain scalability properties with respect to the beam length and cross-section. By using appropriate bending rigidity, the same solution can be used for a thin plate under large cylindrical bending. In addition, a finite element analysis using nonlinear shell elements is also conducted showing the axial strain of the neutral axis to be less than one percent of the overall deformation. Therefore, it is valid to assume that the axial strain is negligible.

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