Establishment of a facial nerve trunk crush injury model and evaluation of facial nerve self-healing in rats.

Introduction/aims: To facilitate further investigation into the mechanisms of facial nerve regeneration, a simple and reliable model of facial nerve crush injury is essential. Nevertheless, the establishment of such models lacks standardization and repeatability, while the healing capacity of the nerve is often overlooked, potentially affecting future studies.

Methods: We made facial nerve trunk crush injury models with different pressing times and detected the changes from the distal nerves to the motoneurons via behavior analysis, electrophysiological test, and histomorphometry analysis.