Will A Release And Dermal-Fat Graft Improve The Tightness After A Sliding Genioplasty?

Q: Dr. Eppley,Hello, I have been a big fan of your work for years and have gone through your Q&A’s to answer a lot of my own questions. Last July, (10 months ago) I got a sliding genioplasty. My chin looks fantastic, however, I do have lots of tightness at the incision area. I would say that there has been no change in the tightness since November. Everything else has been healing nicely. My bottom teeth/gums are no longer numb, flossing is pretty much back to normal etc. Although my bottom lip feels tight, I would say I have 98% of my movement back. So all really looks and feels pretty good, minus the tightness. The tightness feels more severe than it looks. I feel sometimes like I may look like my lip is stiff while I am speaking, but it actually looks pretty normal. The tightness feels like a combo of it being pulled and like having a lot of food stuck in that area. Not sure if that makes sense. Its not painful, but feels very uncomfortable yet still pretty much works the same as before the surgery. Based on all of my internet research, I am thinking that my chin was pulled so far out (doctor said 13mm), that my tissue is most likely falling into that new empty space where my chin was extended. I love the way that I look and do not want to change it, but I also am slightly miserable with this tightness. I read that you do intraoral release and place of dermal fat graft. Not sure if that is relevant to my case, but if it were, how might that change what my chin looks like and what is the general cost for something like that? I am attaching before and after photos so that you have an idea of how much my chin was moved forward. Thank you for being quite the online resource.

A:Your diagnosis and the treatment for it would be the corrective approach. The bone has been expanded but the soft envelope remains the same. In essence you now have a bone shape that is beyond what the soft tissues were designed to contain.

Dr. Barry Eppley

Indianapolis, Indiana