Metal Mouth Message Board

I'm 39, coming on 40 and always had a front tooth pushed forward due to a narrow jaw - so I've had SARPE and the RPE fitted.

I'm now 10 days post-op and am still swollen up but in no real pain to speak of, just that weird pressure. I'm doing three turns a day with the key.

The reason for my post is that they seem to have badly damaged my bottom lip during the procedure - when the surgeon talked to me before the operation they did mention that the lips could become mildy damaged and I had to sign that I understood this to be a possible risk. I though OK, lips are sensitive and become easily irritated and sore so that's to be expected.

I also had my bottom left wisdom tooth (bony horizontal impacted) removed so maybe the damage came when they removed that.

Here is a pic I happened to take after 5 days healing:

[IMG]http://i67.tinypic.com/2z6yrua.jpg[/IMG]

Here is are some pictures from today, remember this is 10 days of healing:

[IMG]http://i66.tinypic.com/2yxf9rq.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i65.tinypic.com/33kfzg2.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i67.tinypic.com/2v30kdw.jpg[/IMG]

[IMG]http://i66.tinypic.com/23gxovd.jpg[/IMG]

My questions are:

Will my lip fully recover or is it likely to remain scarred and misshapen?

Is this level of damage really normal, and if so how could it have happened? I don't see any reason why a lip could become so damaged unless they went through it with some cutting tool or it was constantly squashed between some metal implement and my lower teeth.

Either way that is surely just negligence on the part of the surgery team?

Please share your experiences with damaged lips.

Thanks!

I don't think my lip is going to get any better now:





Should I complain about this or am I just being overly sensitive?

What most annoys me is that it should have been preventable by taking a little more care or protecting my lips better.

I'm also interested to know how this could have happened - is it likely that the impacted lower wisdom tooth had to be sectioned and this damage was caused by some tooth cutting tool?

I don't see this "damage". also 10 days POST OP? That is way too early to complain!

I also didn't see any damage, and I don't think it's considered negligence of the surgery team. Some form of lip injury is bound to happen as instruments are needed to hold your mouth open and to suction saliva for an extended period of time during the surgery and extraction. It is unavoidable and kinda to be expected -
something which they have also highlighted to you before the surgery.

I also had a bruised and blistered lip when I had my wisdom teeth surgery, but it healed up after about 3 weeks. You may need to give it some time to heal but by all means, you can bring this up during your post-surgery follow up and have them assess it.

Here I've marked the area - this first pic is about 10 days after surgery:



And this is how it is now - it's left a V out of my bottom lip:



I can only think that some tool cut right into the lip but can't imagine why or how that would happen. I'm hoping it fills out with time.