How Sliding Genioplasty Is Performed: The Osteotomy, Repositioning and Plate Fixation

The first thing most people do is turn sideways in the mirror. A phone held at arm’s length, a profile photo they never liked, a quiet question that has followed them since school: why does my chin seem to vanish when I look down? By the time someone sits in a consultation asking about a sliding genioplasty procedure, they have usually spent years studying an angle nobody else notices.

What they tend not to know is how mechanical the operation is. There is no filler, no silicone, no sculpting of soft tissue. A surgeon cuts a horseshoe of bone free from the lower jaw, moves it a measured number of millimeters, and screws it back in place. The face changes because the skeleton beneath it has moved.

This explainer walks through that sequence honestly: the cut, the move, the metal, and the weeks that follow, including the risks a good care team will raise before you ever decide.

What is a sliding genioplasty procedure, in plain language?

Genioplasty simply means surgery that changes the shape or position of the chin. The sliding part describes the method: rather than adding material on top of the bone, the surgeon cuts the lower front portion of the jaw free and slides it to a new position.

Picture the lower jaw as a horseshoe. The chin is the curve at the front. In a sliding genioplasty procedure, a horizontal cut is made across that curve, below the roots of the lower teeth and below the small opening where a sensory nerve exits the bone. The piece beneath the cut, roughly the size of a large coin, becomes a separate segment attached only by muscle and its blood supply along the underside.

That segment can be advanced to bring a receding chin forward, set back to reduce a prominent one, lengthened by leaving a gap that fills with new bone, shortened by removing a strip, or rotated to correct a chin that sits off-center. Once it is in the planned position, small plates and screws hold it there while bone knits across the cut.

Three things make this different from a filler or an implant. First, it moves living bone, so the change is structural and the tissue stays part of you. Second, it can correct vertical height and asymmetry, which an implant cannot do. Third, it is a genuine bone operation, with the swelling, healing time and nerve risk that come with one.

The technique is described in the maxillofacial and plastic surgery literature indexed on PubMed as one of the standard options for chin deformity, either alone or alongside jaw realignment surgery. The word that matters in that sentence is option. It is one tool among several, and whether it is the right one depends on the underlying anatomy, not on a preference for surgery over simpler measures.

Chin implant vs sliding genioplasty: why move the bone at all?

People searching chin implant vs sliding genioplasty are asking a fair question: if both make the chin look bigger, why choose the one that involves cutting bone?

The answer sits in what each can and cannot change. A chin implant is a shaped piece of medical-grade material placed over the front of the bone through a small incision under the chin or inside the mouth. It adds projection, meaning it pushes the chin forward, and can add a little width. It cannot make a chin shorter, cannot add meaningful vertical height, and cannot correct a chin that is rotated or shifted to one side. An implant also sits on the bone rather than becoming part of it; over years the bone beneath can remodel, and the implant can shift or become infected, at which point it may need removal.

A sliding genioplasty changes the position of the bone itself, so it can address projection, height and asymmetry in a single operation. The price of that flexibility is a longer procedure, general anesthesia in most cases, more swelling, and the nerve risks described later.

Feature	Chin implant	Sliding genioplasty
What is changed	Material added over the bone	The bone itself is moved
Adds forward projection	Yes	Yes
Reduces a prominent chin	No	Yes (setback)
Changes vertical height	Minimal	Yes (lengthen or shorten)
Corrects asymmetry	Limited	Yes (rotation)
Material left in place	The implant	Small titanium plates and screws
Reversibility	Implant can be removed	Bone heals in place; revision is a further bone operation

Neither is better in the abstract. A surgeon who sees a modest, purely forward deficiency in a patient with normal chin height may reasonably discuss an implant; one who sees a short, retruded, asymmetric chin will usually explain why moving bone answers the problem more completely. The MedlinePlus overview of chin augmentation describes both approaches as accepted methods, which is the right frame: two tools, matched to two different anatomies.

Who is sliding genioplasty usually for, and what is the best age for genioplasty?

The classic candidate has a chin that is set back relative to the lips and nose, sometimes with a deep fold beneath the lower lip where the soft tissue bunches because the bone behind it is short. Others have the opposite: a chin that projects further than the rest of the face. A smaller group has a chin that is too tall, too short, or visibly tilted to one side.

What unites good candidates is that the problem lives in the bone. If the weak chin is really a whole lower jaw that sits too far back, with teeth that do not meet properly, moving the chin alone is like repainting one wall of a crooked room. Surgeons call the teeth-not-meeting problem malocclusion, and when it is present they will usually discuss orthognathic surgery, which realigns the jaw itself, sometimes with genioplasty added as a finishing step. The Mayo Clinic’s jaw surgery overview describes this joint planning between surgeon and orthodontist.

On the best age for genioplasty, the guiding principle is skeletal maturity. Moving bone that is still growing invites the result to change on its own. Mayo Clinic notes that jaw surgery is generally performed after growth stops, which it places at roughly 14 to 16 years for girls and 17 to 21 years for boys, and the same logic applies to the chin. Younger patients are usually asked to wait, with the exception of certain congenital conditions managed by specialist teams.

Others are asked to wait or reconsider for different reasons: active smoking, which impairs bone and wound healing; uncontrolled diabetes or other conditions that raise infection risk; active gum disease near the incision site; unrealistic expectations about what a chin change will do for the rest of life; and body dysmorphic disorder, where distress about appearance is out of proportion to any physical finding and surgery tends not to relieve it. A responsible team screens for these before booking a date, and the final call on suitability sits with that team.

How is the sliding genioplasty procedure planned, and how long does it take?

Planning starts with looking, then measuring. The surgeon assesses the chin in relation to the lips, nose and forehead from the side, and in relation to the facial midline from the front. Standardized photographs follow. A panoramic dental X-ray or a cone-beam CT scan, which is a three-dimensional X-ray of the jaw, shows where the tooth roots end and where the mental nerve exits the bone, the two landmarks the cut must stay clear of.

From those images the team decides the vector: how many millimeters forward or back, how much vertical change, how much rotation. Many surgeons now plan digitally, and some use a printed cutting guide that fits over the bone and marks the exact line of the cut. Others rely on measured marks made during surgery. Both are accepted approaches.

Anesthesia is agreed at a separate pre-operative assessment. Most sliding genioplasty procedures are performed under general anesthesia, meaning you are fully asleep with your breathing supported. MedlinePlus explains that general anesthesia is chosen when an operation is longer, involves bone, or would be difficult to tolerate awake, all of which apply here. Some surgeons use deep sedation with local anesthetic for smaller movements. The anesthetist will ask about medicines, allergies, previous anesthetics and smoking, and will give instructions about fasting.

How long does it take? On its own, the surgery is typically completed within a few hours, with extra time for anesthesia and recovery-room observation; MedlinePlus describes chin surgery in these terms. Combined with jaw realignment, the whole operation is considerably longer and usually involves a hospital stay, as the Mayo Clinic jaw surgery overview outlines. Your own team will give you a specific estimate, and it is reasonable to ask for one in writing.

Step one: the incision inside the mouth and the nerve that matters most

With the patient asleep and the airway secured, the surgeon injects local anesthetic containing a small amount of a blood-vessel-constricting agent into the lower lip and chin. This reduces bleeding and helps tissues separate cleanly. It also means the first hours after waking are often numb rather than painful.

The incision is made inside the mouth, in the groove where the inner lower lip meets the gum, several millimeters away from the gum edge so that a healthy cuff of tissue remains for stitching. Because the cut is intraoral, there is no visible scar on the skin. The trade-off is that the wound sits in a mouth full of bacteria and must be kept clean during healing.

Beneath the lining lies the mentalis muscle, the small paired muscle that lifts the chin and lower lip. The surgeon divides it in a way that leaves enough attached to the bone segment to repair later. If the mentalis is not properly resuspended at the end, the soft tissue of the chin can droop, a problem surgeons call chin ptosis. Preserving and repairing this muscle is one of the quieter skills of the operation.

Next comes the landmark that shapes every later decision: the mental nerve. This branch of the trigeminal nerve exits the jawbone through a small opening called the mental foramen, roughly beneath the second premolar tooth on each side, and supplies feeling to the lower lip, the chin skin and the gum. The surgeon exposes and identifies it on both sides before any cutting instrument approaches the bone. Reviews of genioplasty complications indexed on PubMed consistently name sensory disturbance in this nerve’s territory as the most frequent complication, which is why so much care is spent here.

The periosteum, the thin membrane covering bone, is lifted just enough to see the planned cut line, while the tissue along the lower border is left attached to protect the blood supply that will keep the segment alive.

Step two: how the osteotomy is made

An osteotomy is a controlled surgical cut through bone. In sliding genioplasty it runs horizontally across the front of the jaw from one side to the other, and the surgeon marks its path before cutting.

Two rules govern where that line sits. It must be at least a few millimeters below the tips of the tooth roots, because the canine roots in particular run deep and a cut that clips them can damage the tooth. It must also run below the mental foramen on each side, with a margin, because the nerve canal curves downward inside the bone before it exits and can be injured by a cut that looks safe on the surface. The pre-operative scan tells the surgeon where these structures lie. A small vertical mark scored on the bone across the planned line records the midline so the segment can be realigned accurately after it moves.

The cut is made with a reciprocating or oscillating saw, a fine burr, or increasingly a piezoelectric device, which uses ultrasonic vibration to cut mineralized bone while sparing soft tissue such as nerve. Constant irrigation with saline stops the bone overheating, since heat kills the bone cells needed later to heal the gap.

The saw is angled slightly downward as it travels from front to back on each side, so the cut exits the lower border of the jaw behind the chin. This oblique path matters. A longer cut offers more surface for healing and lets the segment glide along the plane of the cut rather than lifting off it. The very back of the cut is often finished with a thin osteotome, a chisel-like instrument, tapped gently, to avoid driving a saw blade toward the nerve or the soft tissue behind the bone.

Once the cut is complete on both sides, the segment moves freely but remains attached to the muscles and tissue along its underside, which carry its blood vessels. The surgeon checks that mobility, confirms both nerves are intact, and only then turns to repositioning.

Step three: repositioning the chin segment

Repositioning is where the plan drawn on a screen becomes a change in a face. The freed segment is grasped with a small clamp or hook and moved along the plane of the cut into the position measured beforehand.

Advancement, the most common movement, slides the segment forward. Because the cut is angled, moving forward along it also lifts the segment slightly, so surgeons account for that when planning the vertical result. Larger advancements leave a step at the back edge on each side, which is smoothed with a burr to avoid a palpable ledge under the skin.

Setback moves the segment backward to reduce a prominent chin. Here the surgeon must avoid pushing the bone against the soft tissue behind it and must trim the resulting bony overhang so the profile stays smooth.

Vertical lengthening is done by rotating the segment downward and leaving a gap between it and the jaw above. That gap is often filled with a bone graft, taken from the patient or from a processed donor bone product, or with a synthetic bone substitute, to give new bone a scaffold to grow across. Vertical shortening is done by cutting a second parallel line and removing the strip of bone between the two.

Asymmetry is corrected by rotating or shifting the segment so that the midline mark scored earlier lines up with the true facial midline, then trimming any steps. Some surgeons split the segment into two or three pieces to widen or narrow the chin, though this adds complexity and is not routine.

Throughout, the surgeon judges the result against the plan and against the whole face on the table, knowing that soft-tissue thickness means the skin will not move millimeter-for-millimeter with the bone. Studies on PubMed describe the ratio of soft-tissue to bone movement as variable rather than fixed, which is one honest reason surgeons avoid promising an exact final profile.

Step four: plate fixation and closing the wound

Bone heals only if it is held still. Once the segment sits where the plan says it should, the surgeon fixes it with small plates and screws made of titanium, a metal chosen because bone tolerates it well and it rarely provokes a reaction. The plates are thin, often shaped in advance to match the intended step, and are secured with short screws placed in the upper part of the segment and the jaw above, well clear of tooth roots and the nerve canal.

Several plate designs exist: pre-bent step plates sized to the exact millimeters of advancement, flat plates bent by hand on the table, and in some practices custom plates made from the patient’s own scan. Each is an accepted method. Some surgeons use resorbable plates made of polymers that dissolve over months; the literature on PubMed describes these as an alternative, with trade-offs in strength and swelling that are weighed case by case.

The plates are not usually removed afterward. They sit under the muscle and, once bone has healed across the cut, carry no load. Occasionally a plate becomes exposed through the gum, loosens, or causes persistent tenderness, and a second small procedure is arranged to take it out. Some people can feel the plate edge with a fingertip for a while; this usually softens as the tissue settles.

With fixation complete, the surgeon irrigates the wound, checks for bleeding, and turns to a step patients rarely hear about but that strongly influences the final appearance: resuspending the mentalis muscle. The divided muscle is stitched back to its bony attachment so the chin soft tissue stays lifted rather than sagging below the bone. The mouth lining is then closed with dissolving stitches. A firm pressure dressing or elastic tape is applied over the chin from the outside for the first days, to limit swelling and help the soft tissue redrape onto the new bone contour.

Sliding genioplasty recovery time: what the first days and weeks look like

Ask about sliding genioplasty recovery time and you will hear different answers, because recovered means different things: back at a desk, able to chew normally, swelling fully gone, or bone completely healed. Each has its own timeline.

The first day is dominated by numbness from the local anesthetic and the beginnings of swelling. Most people wake with a tight chin dressing, a lower lip that feels thick and does not move quite right, and instructions to keep the head elevated. Bleeding from the mouth incision is usually minor. Depending on the surgeon and whether other procedures were combined, patients go home the same day or after one night, as MedlinePlus describes for chin surgery.

Days two to four are typically the peak of swelling. The chin and lower lip can look dramatically larger than the planned result, which alarms almost everyone. Cold compresses, head elevation and a soft or liquid diet are standard advice. Speech may sound slightly slurred while the lip is swollen and numb.

Over the first two weeks the outer dressing comes off, swelling recedes noticeably, and most people return to non-strenuous work. Mouth rinses and careful brushing away from the incision keep the wound clean while the dissolving stitches soften. Chewing hard foods is usually restricted until the surgeon is satisfied with early healing.

For the bone itself, the reference point patients can trust comes from the Mayo Clinic’s jaw surgery overview: initial healing of cut jawbone typically takes around six weeks, and complete healing can take up to twelve weeks. Genioplasty alone is a smaller operation than full jaw realignment, so many surgeons lift restrictions sooner, but that 6–12 week frame is a sensible one for discussing contact sports and heavy exertion.

Residual swelling and the last of the lip numbness can take months to settle, and the final contour is generally judged after that. Every one of these ranges is typical rather than promised; your own team’s instructions override anything written here.

How painful is sliding genioplasty?

Most people are surprised by the answer: sliding genioplasty is usually described as more uncomfortable than painful. The chin is tight, the lower lip is numb and clumsy, and the mouth incision stings when eating, but the deep aching that follows some bone operations is often milder than expected. Two reasons: the local anesthetic placed during surgery blunts the first hours, and the mental nerve, which would carry pain from the area, is often temporarily stunned by the surgery itself.

That said, pain is individual, and combining genioplasty with jaw surgery changes the picture considerably. The Mayo Clinic notes that pain after jaw surgery is managed with medicines and that swelling is expected and gradual to resolve.

Surgeons commonly use a stepped approach. Acetaminophen, which acts within the central nervous system to raise the pain threshold, and non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, which block the enzymes that make inflammatory chemicals at the wound, form the base for many patients. A short course of a stronger analgesic may be considered for the first days if these are not enough. Which of these you receive, in what form and for how long, depends on your medical history, bleeding risk and kidney function, and is entirely a decision for the prescribing clinician. Do not adjust anything you are given without speaking to them.

Non-medicine measures matter more than people expect: keeping the head elevated even when lying down, applying cold compresses in the first days, sticking to a soft diet that does not stretch the lip, and rinsing gently rather than spitting forcefully. Sleeping propped up reduces morning swelling, and morning swelling is a large part of what people experience as pain.

Pain that escalates after the first few days rather than easing is not normal recovery. It belongs in the section on when to call your doctor, and it should not be waited out.

How risky is a sliding genioplasty? Sliding genioplasty risks explained

How risky is a sliding genioplasty? The honest answer is that it is a well-established bone operation with a recognized set of complications, most of which are temporary or manageable, and a small number of which can be lasting. What follows draws on reviews of genioplasty complications indexed on PubMed and on general surgical risks described by MedlinePlus and the NHS.

Sensory change is the headline risk. Numbness, tingling or altered feeling in the lower lip and chin, called paresthesia, is common in the weeks after surgery because the mental nerve has been stretched, bruised or heated. Most of it resolves over weeks to months as the nerve recovers. In a minority of patients some altered sensation persists, and permanent numbness, though uncommon, is reported. A surgeon who says the nerve risk is zero is not being straight with you.

Other recognized sliding genioplasty risks include:

• Bleeding and hematoma, a collection of blood under the tissue that may need draining.
• Infection at the intraoral wound or around the plate, which the mouth’s bacteria make possible.
• Wound breakdown, or dehiscence, where the stitched lining opens and exposes bone or metal.
• Plate loosening, exposure or discomfort requiring later removal.
• Injury to tooth roots from a cut placed too high.
• Chin ptosis, where soft tissue sags because the mentalis muscle was not adequately reattached.
• Bone resorption at the edges of the moved segment, which can slightly reduce the achieved projection over time.
• Asymmetry, over- or under-correction, or a visible step at the edge of the segment.
• General anesthetic risks, which MedlinePlus describes as low in healthy people but never absent.

Rare but serious problems include loss of blood supply to the segment, which can lead to bone death, and airway swelling in the immediate post-operative period. These are among the reasons the operation belongs in a properly equipped surgical setting with anesthetic support.

No reliable, guideline-level percentage can be quoted for any of these without reference to a specific study population, so this article does not quote one. Your surgeon should be able to describe how often each occurs in their practice and what is done when it does.

What people often get wrong about sliding genioplasty

Myth: it is a cosmetic tweak, like a filler. It is a bone operation performed under general anesthesia, with plates, screws and a healing period measured in weeks. Treating it as minor leads to disappointment in week one, when swelling is at its worst.

Myth: the skin moves exactly as far as the bone. It does not. Soft tissue is thick, elastic and variable, and the research literature on PubMed describes the relationship between bone movement and profile change as a range rather than a fixed ratio. Surgeons plan with this in mind, which is one reason they avoid promising a precise final look.

Myth: there is a scar under the chin. In a sliding genioplasty the incision is inside the mouth. A scar beneath the chin belongs to some implant techniques and certain neck procedures, not to this one.

Myth: the plates must be taken out later. Titanium plates are generally left permanently unless they cause a problem. Removal is the exception, arranged only when a plate is exposed, loose or painful.

Myth: numbness means the nerve was cut. Temporary altered sensation is expected after almost every sliding genioplasty because the nerve is handled, stretched and lies next to a cutting instrument. Most of it recovers. Persisting numbness should be discussed with the team, but its presence in the early weeks is not by itself a sign of error.

Myth: it fixes a receding jaw. It changes the chin. If the lower jaw itself sits back and the teeth do not meet properly, moving the chin alone can improve the profile but leaves the bite untouched. That is when orthognathic surgery enters the conversation, as the Mayo Clinic’s overview explains.

Myth: younger is better. Bone still growing can change after surgery. Skeletal maturity, not eagerness, determines timing.

Myth: it is reversible. Bone heals where it is placed. Revision is possible, but it is another operation, not an undo button.

Questions to ask your care team

A consultation is short, and the questions that matter tend to arrive on the drive home. Writing them down beforehand changes the quality of the conversation. Consider asking:

• Is the problem in the chin bone alone, or do my lower jaw and bite also need attention? How did you decide?
• Would an implant address my concern? Why or why not, for my anatomy specifically?
• Exactly how many millimeters do you plan to move the segment, and in which directions? Can I see the plan on the scan?
• How do you protect the mental nerve during the cut, and how often do your patients have lasting numbness?
• What type of fixation will you use, and under what circumstances would the plate later be removed?
• How will you reattach the mentalis muscle, and what do you do to prevent chin sagging?
• Will the operation be under general anesthesia? Who is the anesthetist, and where is it performed?
• What will the first two weeks realistically look like for eating, speaking and returning to work?
• What signs of a problem should make me call, and who answers that phone at night and on weekends?
• If the result is asymmetric or not what we planned, what happens next, and is revision something you perform?
• Am I being asked to stop smoking, adjust any medicines or see a dentist first? Why?

Two further questions deserve a moment of courage. Ask what the surgeon would recommend if you were their family member, and ask whether they think you might be better served by not having surgery at all. The answers, and how readily they come, tell you a great deal about the team you are considering. The NHS guidance on cosmetic procedures makes the same point: a reputable practitioner will discuss alternatives, risks and the option of doing nothing, and will not pressure you to decide on the day.

When to call your doctor

Recovery has a rhythm: worst around day three, then steadily better. Anything that breaks that rhythm deserves a phone call, and the team that operated should have given you a number that reaches a clinician around the clock. Use it. Surgeons would far rather hear about a false alarm than about a real one caught late.

Call your surgical team promptly if you notice:

• Swelling that increases sharply after the first few days, especially on one side, or a chin that feels tense and looks purple, which can indicate a hematoma.
• Bleeding from the mouth incision that soaks through gauze and does not settle with gentle pressure.
• Fever, chills, a foul taste, pus, or increasing redness and heat over the chin, which suggest infection.
• Pain that worsens rather than eases after day three, or pain not controlled by the plan your team gave you.
• The wound inside the mouth opening up, or a hard edge of plate or bone becoming visible through the gum.
• Numbness that spreads to new areas, or weakness of the lip that was not present in the first days.
• Any lower front tooth becoming loose, darkening or intensely sensitive.

Seek emergency care immediately, rather than waiting for a call back, if you have difficulty breathing or swallowing, rapidly increasing swelling of the mouth or neck, chest pain, sudden shortness of breath, or calf pain and swelling in one leg, which can signal a blood clot after any operation. MedlinePlus and the NHS list these among the reasons to seek urgent help after surgery.

Finally, a quieter red flag: if, weeks in, the result is causing distress rather than relief, tell your team. Swelling can mislead for months, and an early honest conversation is far more useful than a silent one. Every decision about further treatment, whether reassurance, imaging or revision, rests with the surgeon who knows your case.

Frequently asked questions

How risky is a sliding genioplasty?

It is a well-established bone operation with recognized complications, most of them temporary or manageable. The most frequently reported is altered sensation in the lower lip and chin from handling of the mental nerve, which usually improves over weeks to months, though lasting numbness is reported in a minority. Bleeding, infection, plate problems, tooth root injury and soft-tissue sagging are also described. Your surgeon should explain how often each occurs in their own practice.

How painful is sliding genioplasty?

Most people describe it as uncomfortable and tight rather than severely painful, partly because the local anesthetic placed during surgery and the temporarily stunned nerve blunt sensation in the first days. Swelling, a numb clumsy lip and a stinging mouth incision dominate week one. Pain is managed with a plan set by the prescribing clinician, usually built on simple analgesics, alongside head elevation, cold compresses and a soft diet. Pain that worsens after day three should be reported.

What is the best age for genioplasty?

Once facial growth has finished. Mayo Clinic notes that jaw surgery is generally performed after growth stops, roughly 14 to 16 years in girls and 17 to 21 in boys, and surgeons apply the same principle to the chin so the result does not shift as bone continues to grow. There is no upper age limit in itself; general health, bone quality and wound-healing factors such as smoking matter more than the number.

Why does this article not say how much a sliding genioplasty costs?

Because no single figure would be honest. The total depends on the setting, the type of anesthesia, whether the chin operation is combined with jaw realignment or orthodontics, imaging and follow-up, and where you live, so any number printed here would mislead most readers. The administrative staff of your treating team can give you an itemized estimate for your specific plan, which is the only figure worth relying on.

What is the typical sliding genioplasty recovery time before returning to work?

Many people return to desk-based work within about two weeks, once the outer dressing is off and the worst swelling has receded, though speech can still sound slightly thick. Mayo Clinic’s jaw surgery guidance places initial bone healing at around six weeks and complete healing at up to twelve, which is the frame surgeons use when discussing contact sports and heavy exertion. Your own team’s timeline takes precedence over any general range.

Chin implant vs sliding genioplasty: which is right for me?

That depends on what needs to change. An implant adds forward projection and a little width but cannot shorten a chin, add meaningful height or correct rotation. A sliding genioplasty moves the bone itself, so it can address projection, vertical height and asymmetry together, at the cost of a longer operation, more swelling and nerve risk. A surgeon who examines your bone on a scan can explain which fits your anatomy.

What are the sliding genioplasty risks to the nerve, and are they permanent?

The mental nerve, which gives feeling to the lower lip and chin, exits the bone close to the cut line and is stretched and handled during surgery. Altered sensation afterward is common and usually fades over weeks to months as the nerve recovers. Permanent numbness is uncommon but is reported in the PubMed literature, and no responsible surgeon will promise a zero risk. Careful identification of the nerve and cut placement below its canal reduce it.

Will there be a visible scar after sliding genioplasty?

No skin scar is created, because the incision is made inside the mouth in the groove between the lower lip and gum. The scar that results lies in the mouth lining and is hidden. Some people notice a small firm ridge inside the lip for a while as it heals. A scar beneath the chin is associated with certain implant approaches and neck procedures, not with the sliding technique.

Do the titanium plates and screws stay in forever?

Usually, yes. Titanium is well tolerated by bone, and once the cut has healed the plates carry no load and cause no symptoms for most people. Removal is arranged only if a plate becomes exposed through the gum, loosens, or causes persistent tenderness, and that is a smaller second procedure. Some surgeons use resorbable plates that dissolve over months, with trade-offs in strength that are weighed case by case.

Can a sliding genioplasty be reversed or redone?

It can be revised, but not undone. Bone heals in the position where it was fixed, so returning it or adjusting it means another osteotomy, with the same healing period and nerve considerations as the first. Revision is sometimes discussed for asymmetry, under- or over-correction, or bone resorption at the segment edges. Because swelling can distort the appearance for months, surgeons usually wait until healing is complete before judging whether any change is warranted.

References

• Chin augmentation – MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia
• General anesthesia – MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia
• Cosmetic procedures – NHS
• Sliding genioplasty complications – PubMed (NIH) search results

This article is for general information only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Please consult a qualified doctor about your individual situation.