Nerve damage jowls and chin liposuction, 24 days post surgery. I can’t lower my bottom lip when smiling.

Question

I had jowel and neck liposuction combined with Facetight ( a procedure like a facelift but not ). It’s been 25 days since the surgery and my lower lip won’t pull down when I smile. My neck also feels extremely tight and is restricted, I can’t look up (pull head back) as far as I used to without pain and tightness. I had shooting pains and tingling a in my left side chin. Prior to surgery he mentioned he had to go “behind the neck muscle” for the liposuction. How can I speed up the process?

Michael P. Morrissette, DDS, FACS · Answer

The combination of neck liposuction and Facetite tends to increase the risk of temporary nerve dysfunction. This can occur from either the manual trauma from the liposuction or the heat from the Facetite device. I have seen several cases of temporary nerve dysfunction with this combination of treatment and the nerve was completely recovered within 3 months. 25 days is a rather short amount of time and so I would allow for more recovery time. There is no treatment to speed the recovery.

John Mesa, MD · Answer

Nerves of the face can be affected by treatments like liposuction or facetime. When that happens, the nerve healing process takes 1mm a day. Therefore, healing process is slow. 
Patients with post surgical healing issues should adhere to the recommendations of the surgeon that performed the operation.

Sagar Patel, MD · Answer

Call you doctor and make sure he or she is aware. THere is nothing that can be done to speed up the process. Nerve healing or Wallerian regeneration is a complex process that has been studied for decades. If it were a large nerve that was cut you can go back in there and reattach it manually. Otherwise its a matter of the nerve sheath regrowing and conduction to the muscle starting again. This takes time and your doctors job is to walk you through the process.

Mats Hagstrom, MD (license on probation) · Answer

Most nerve injuries are referred to as neurapraxia. There are different levels of these. Different procedures can cause different types of neurapraxia.  Recovery can take anywhere from a few hours to over a year.  There's no way to speed up this process.  The nerve that was damaged is most likely the mandibular branch of the facial nerve.  It sits right in front of The jowls below the corner of your mouth.  If this was from liposuction then you should see some return of motor function within a few months.  If this was related to a facelift procedure then it could take longer.  Best, Mats Hagstrom MD

Nerve damage jowls and chin liposuction, 24 days post surgery. I can’t lower my bottom lip when smiling.

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