As well as coping with the way your face looks, you may also have to overcome some debilitating physical effects. Swelling and bruising to the eyes, mouth and jaw can prevent you seeing, eating and speaking normally. Many people are scared they will have permanent scarring or a facial deformity once the tissues have healed. Fortunately, we expert help and patience, many patients are relieved to find their appearance slowly returns to normal.
Mr Hodges has a wealth of experience in treating facial injuries and in facial reconstruction, which means he is well-placed to guide you through the treatment process. When you come in for a consultation after suffering a facial injury, he will assess which structures have been damaged, the extent of the damage, and which functions have been affected by the injury. Usually X-rays or scans are also required to help diagnose the pattern of injury.
Once all the examinations and tests have been completed, Mr Hodges will sit down with you to discuss treatment options, explaining each one carefully and answering your questions..
Mr Hodges specialises in treating facial trauma using cutting edge techniques so that you can have the best cosmetic result as well as the best recovery of function.
“When I plan any facial reconstruction after injury my goal is to repair the injuries very sensitively. I am able to use my cosmetic surgery training in additional to my maxillofacial surgery training to give you the best aesthetic outcome. This involves many techniques, including placing scars in the mouth, in skin creases, or within the hairline,” explains Mr Hodges.
Breaking a bone in your face is less common than breaking an arm or a wrist, for example, but it can happen. Broken facial bones can be the result of a traffic accident, a serious fall, playing contact sports and suffering violence.
The face actually has many different bones that can break, including the lower jaw (mandible), the upper jaw (maxilla), the cheek bone (zygoma), the eye socket, the nose and the forehead (frontal) bone.
These may be broken either individually, or often within well-known patterns of injury, for example, a cheekbone injury will often also involve the eye socket.
The signs of broken facial bones include:
If you have injured your face and are concerned that you may have broken a bone, it is important to get it checked out as soon as possible as the bones can heal in the wrong position if not corrected. This can make treatment more complicated and can cause cosmetic and/or functional problems in the long term.
Treating a broken facial bone involves many of the same principles used to treat any other bone fracture:
Your face contains many different soft tissues that can be injured including the skin, nerves, blood vessels, muscles and salivary glands. Soft tissue injuries to the face can be caused by blunt or sharp trauma. Signs of soft tissue injury depend on the soft tissue involved:
The treatment of these injuries include, simple advice such as rest and painkillers, an operation to clean and repair the injury or more extensive reconstruction of the area affected. The good news is that facial wounds heal very well, scars usually fade and function and appearance improve over time.