Commentary “Intratemporal Grafting of the Facial Nerve following Lateral Skull Base Tumor Resection”

This is a nice and concise report by the authors describing the results of facial nerve reconstruction with interposition grafting in a variety of tumors at the skull base. It is interesting to note that 29 of the patients already had complete facial palsy at presentation. It would have been useful for the reader to know the duration of the facial palsy before the operation and whether this affected the ultimate facial function outcome. It would also have been important to know if the facial recovery was more to the lower or upper face and if additional procedures were needed to augment eye closure in this group of patients. The overall results are in keeping with the experience of other authors with such patients. The present conclusions are important in that the length of the graft or postoperative radiation did not impact on the outcome. This type of facial nerve reconstruction should be the treatment option of choice whenever the facial nerve is sacrificed at the skull base.