MMA measurement quandary
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MMA measurement quandary

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Posted by arcticranger on April 15, 2012 at 06:10:06:

I'm one of those guys who had a failed MMA. The surgeon here in New York told me he would be advancing my jaw 10mm, the standard approach. The operation left me with permanent nerve damage, a speech impediment, a frown shape to my mouth, and zero apnea reduction (new tests were done). The operation took over a year to recoup from, if you can call me recuperated.

Cost of surgery: 97K. Amazing eh?

I've since seen three REAL surgeons who uniformly state I was given an advancement of approx 4-5mm I then asked the original surgeon for his own statement on this. Here are his responses:

1) Your original surgery involved moving both the maxillae forward some 5mm and the mandible forward some 9-10 mm for a total of 18mm.

2) Measured the xrays and the net movement was 11mm forward on the actual measurements post operatiely.

3) Risregard the 18 that was a typo.


I finally wrote to him that his answers were unclear, I did not understand his use of the phrase "net movement", and that multiple orthogathnic surgeons here in New York were unable to determine the advancement of my jaw due to a lack of any scale on the films. His response:

4) If the surgeon digitizes each film and than superimposes the unmoved cranial landmarks on Dolphin Imaging he will see the movements measure out at 11mm. If he wants the superimposed tracings from Dolphin we can send them to you or him as you would like.

So my question to the forum is: are these answers deliberately vague or perhaps just over my head? I do not know any MMA surgeon who has the time to perform this superimposition task. Would it even be accurate?

How does a 'real' MMA surgeon determine advancement amount after a procedure?

Really need help, appreciate any advice.

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