Metal Mouth Message Board

Hi guys I'm getting upper and lower jaw surgery in 2 days and am worried about a few things. Two of my orthos have said I'd need genio to balance my face after surgery and my surgeon with 5 years experience said the same. The head surgeon however with 30 years experience says I don't need it because the soft tissue will ride up creating the desired aesthetic, but I'm not too sure about this. Anyone else had this experience?

I'm also wondering, how strong can the bones be again post-recovery? I do many contact sports so hope I don't have to give them up forever.

I can't really help you there. At first I was supposed to get upper jaw surgery (advance by 7mm + impaction 3mm) and lower jaw surgery to fix the asymmetry in the lower jaw. However, as the treatment went on, the ortho realized that my lip incompetence wouldn't be fixed completely by the upper jaw surgery itself and he decided that I should a genioplasty to fix the lip incompetence.

So if you don't have a lip incompetence, perhaps you don't need a genio, my 2 cents.

The contact sports question is totally one for your surgeon, and probably not until after the surgery. According to my surgeon, my bone was "paper thin" so I imagine if I had asked, he would probably have suggested a very long time, if ever.

As far as the genio goes: I'd trust your surgeon... sounds like he's been at it a while.