Kate's Fear of TMJ

2 Tips For Improving Your Recovery From Orthognathic Surgery

While braces are great for fixing alignment issues caused by your teeth, some issues are more difficult to fix. If you suffer from poor jaw structure, then you may need the assistance of a jaw corrective surgery in order to fix this issue. Therefore, your dentist may have already suggested orthognathic surgery. Poor jaw structure should be fixed as soon as possible because it can lead to many issues with chewing and sleeping in the future. After your orthognathic surgery is complete, you will need to take a few weeks to recover. The recovery time will be painful, but there are a few tips that can help your recovery go as smoothly as possible.

Make Sure that You Stick to a Liquid Diet

After an orthognathic surgery, you will experience difficulty moving your jaw. This makes it extremely difficult to eat and speak until your surgical area begins to heal. In order to promote healing, you need to make sure that this area is not irritated. In order to do this, you will have to change up your diet. Solid foods can not only puncture your surgical wounds but they can also cause you additional pain. Therefore, after the surgery, your diet should consist of liquid foods. A shake or bowl of soup is much easier to consume and will require very little effort. This diet should be kept up during the first few weeks following your surgery. Once the stiffness and pain subside, you will be able to begin introducing more solid foods back into your diet.

Do not Avoid Cleaning Your Mouth

When you notice that it is difficult to open and close your mouth following orthognathic surgery, you may be tempted to avoid cleaning it often. However, this can lead to a lot of bacteria development. Once bacteria develops, it can work its way into the surgical sites throughout your mouth that have not properly healed and cause infection. Suffering an infection after orthognathic surgery is extremely painful and will result in more dental procedures in order to solve the issue. Talk to your dentist about what brushing and flossing techniques will work best during your recovery.

Orthognathic surgery can involve an extensive recovery process, but the process is well worth the wait when you are left with a fully corrected jaw. Use these tips and talk to a dentist like those at Persona  Dental to make sure that your recovery process is successful once your orthognathic procedure is completed.   


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