SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR MEASURING AND QUANTITATING FACIAL MOVEMENTS

A system and method for measuring and quantitating facial movements useful in detecting, characterizing and treating facial paralysis or abnormal facial movements. A preferred embodiment of the system comprises a plurality of markers applied to a plurality of facial zones, apparatus for recording images of the marked face at repose and for recording images of the marked face at selected maximal facial movements, apparatus for assigning location coordinates to the markers of each recorded facial image, apparatus for converting location coordinates of each marker of each facial image to actual positions on the face, apparatus for determining the change in actual marker position on the face at each selected maximal facial movement and apparatus for displaying the actual marker position changes for each selected facial movement. A preferred embodiment of the method comprises the steps of applying a plurality of markers to a plurality of facial zones, recording images of the marked face at repose and recording images of the marked face at selected maximal facial movements, assigning location coordinates to the markers of the facial images, converting the location coordinates of each marker to actual positions on the face, determining the change in actual marker position for each selected maximal facial movement, and displaying the actual positional changes of each marker for each selected facial movement.