Need your help in regards to numbness

[shedevilcanada]

Hi everybody, need your help to get my anxiety attack to stop.

So has anybody experience complete numbness of lower
lip and a part of the chin after major chin work?
If yes, how long did it take to get the sensation to come back? Did you get 100% sensation back?

I'm freaking out a bit, its been 40 days post up and still not even a glimpse of the sensation has come back. I'm scared of having nerve damages.

so your help would be greatly appreciated and it would reduce my stress and anxiety level.

thank you all in advance

[luna nyan]

Have you talked to the treating surgeon yet?  If you haven't yet done so, please do so immediately so that your current neural responses can be documented correctly and progress reviewed accurately.

It can take anything up to 9months for recovery, usually the mental nerve bundle is located and carefully protected during this soot of work.  However, if it was extensive work, and the amount of swelling severe, then compression of the nerve is likely and that will take time to recover.

If it makes you feel better, the nerve bundle in question is often exposed for a lot of procedures and full recovery is routinely expected.

I think it is unlikely that the nerve was severed - even in those cases, most have some degree of recovery.

Did you have a genioplasty done?

[Dahlia]

40 days post op is short. And since the corners of your mouth don't droop or whatever....it just takes time.
Good luck!

[luna nyan]

40 days post op is short. And since the corners of your mouth don't droop or whatever....it just takes time.
Good luck!

That's separate innervation I'm afraid.

Sensation to the lip and chin area is from the Mandibular branch of the trigeminal nerve (cranial nerve V).  If an intraoral approach is used to access the chin area, in order to get sufficient retraction to access the bone, the mental nerve has to be exposed and dissected out to safely allow access.

If you're talking about the nerves that supply the muscles around the lip, you're talking about facial nerve (cranial nerve VII) which have a different route and generally are not at risk.

As I said before, give it time and most, if not all, sensation should return.

Edits:  yeesh, my 70oth post, and it had to be on nerves and carniofacial anatomy! *shudder*

[shedevilcanada]

thank you Dahlia and Luna, it helps relievinng the anxiety I am
getting about what if I don't get my sensitivity back.

i have discussed this with the surgeon, and like you both said , he said that it just takes time and that its normal to have that at rhe beginning. I trust him totally but wanted to have an opinion from my fellow sisters, I feel more reassured to have somebody that had the same procedure with the same numbness to tell me that it will all come back.

I dont think I had sliding genioplasty done (if this is with cutting bones and putting them back together with titanium screws and plates), but I kmow that he went imside the mouth to do chin job. There is still lots of swelling also in that area.

Thank you again for your wonderful responses

[luna nyan]

If there is still a lot of swelling then the numbness is to be expected.  When it starts to go down, you should start to get some sensation back.

I haven't had any work done on myself - it's just an area that I am very familiar with, but I'm glad to have been of help. 

I hope the test of your recovery is uneventful.

Hugs,
Luna
(And I'd be a nightmare patient to deal with btw...)

[shedevilcanada]

If there is still a lot of swelling then the numbness is to be expected.  When it starts to go down, you should start to get some sensation back.

I haven't had any work done on myself - it's just an area that I am very familiar with, but I'm glad to have been of help. 

I hope the test of your recovery is uneventful.

Hugs,
Luna
(And I'd be a nightmare patient to deal with btw...)

Thank you you have been a great help