Possible infection in plate in jaw :(

[loulou123]

Woke up this morning and the left side of my face was more swollen then when i went to bed last night

i had an appointment with the ortho to check things anyway and when i showed her, she paged my surgeon.

Once hed turned up and taken a look at it, he thinks i may have an infection around the plate they used to secure my jaw, they are waiting to see if my face swells up anymore (tho not quite sure what they will do, as the surgeon said that the plates cannot be removed for several weeks yet) but they are talking about removing them when they can, if it prove to be an infection.

Has anyone else had this happen to them??

One side of my jaw has caused me problems from day 1, with hemorraging post op, to being excessively more swollen and bruised and now this so im abit peed off.

On the positive side tho, my ortho commented how well i was cleaning my teeth and mouth, so at least i know im not to blame in anyway for whats happening

[tazzle]

so sorry to hear that louise .... did they not take any x rays ? .......... at least you have had antiobiotics already ..... have they given you any others ??/ I remeber once of my abcesses needed two different lots to shift !!!

[dubnobass]

Oh dear, that's not good
Hopefully they will be able to dose you up with antibiotics until they can do something surgically - though I think it can sometimes be hard to treat bone infections without you being on a drip. I would guess they will look for swelling, then do blood tests and x-rays, then surgery as a last resort.

I'm sorry you're having such a rough time with post-surgical complications. I suppose it's inevitable (and sad) that with so many of us here going through surgery, a few will have problems. Fingers crossed they can sort it out.

[clairet707]

Oh my god, Lou, thats bad


Hope things settle down very quick for you, it must be a nightmare not knowing whats going on

Get well vibes coming your way

[loulou123]

Thanks guys to be honest at the moment im taking it quite well, as its not the 1st time ive had this sort of problem and got serious infection in my jaw a few years ago (ironically on the other side of my mouth)

Tazzle-no more antibiotics, app as i can taste the pus (nice ) it means its trying to drain away, so there waiting to see what happens and whether the infections comes out and oozes out into my mouth or it will form in a pocket and cause big swellings in which case they will step in and do something

dubnobass-thank you, as ive said above its just a case of waiting at the mo and seeing which way the inection goes does seem unfortanete that some people have lots of probs and some none, but thats life i guess. And all the problems have at least been with the same side!!

Thanks clairet-it will be a relief to know one way or the other.

[vgmessenger]

Hey so sorry to hear you having problems. I had BSSO in June 2007 and I had to have the left side plate removed in November 2007 due to the fact that it was infected. Since then the only other problems I have is the fact that my teeth are still biting edge to edge. We are working on that, and I have some new loop hardware ?? I hope everything goes well I you do not not have anymore problems.

Victoria

[loulou123]

victoria- thanks for the reply,

as the only person ive heard from so far whose had it done, would you mind telling me about it? Do they do it under general anesethic, is it a bad op etc (guessing its gotta be easier than the original)

Thanks

[vgmessenger]

The surgery was not bad at all. It was done in the OS office, no hosptial stay, i was under general ans. I started with the IV but when i woke up in recovery, it was out. I did wake up in the middle to them trying to find all the screws. 2 of the screws had fallen out ( the cause of the infection) and were stuck in the soft tissue. Once they realized i was not completely out, they gave me some more meds. I think we were only there a couple of hours max. I went home with a pain med and antibiotic. Minor swelling over the weekend but nothing like the BSSO. It was so worth it!! Hope this helps you. Oh and I had no additional costs for having to have the plate removed.

Victoria