Intraoral malarplasty Including Zygomatic process of maxilla.

Yoon, In Dae; Kim, Young Hwan; Kim, Jin Hwan; Choe, Joon; Park, Jae Hyun

Original Article

Journal of the Korean Society of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons 1999;26(5):781-785.
Published online September 1, 1999.

Intraoral malarplasty Including Zygomatic process of maxilla.

In Dae Yoon, Young Hwan Kim, Jin Hwan Kim, Joon Choe, Jae Hyun Park

Abstract

The malar bones are major determinants of mid-facial shape. In an oriental population, malar prominences are considered an unpleasing and undesirable feature because they give the face a triangular shape and may produce an emaciated and sunken appearance. There are two main operative approaches to malarplasty. One is a coronal approach and the other is a intraoral approach. The former possess advantages of symmetricity, accuracy and superiorly, medially and posteriorly aesthetical transposition of the malar bone. However, it has drawbacks such as a long visible scar on the scalp and extensive operation. Though the latter is a simple method avoiding a visible scar, it has some problems of asymmetricity, cheekdrooping, partial transposition of the malar complex and difficulty of aesthetic transposition. The authors intended to perform intraoral malarplasty for symmetrically aesthetic transposition of the whole malar bone without cheekdrooping. From February 1996 to January 1999, 9 female patients with prominent malar complex, in whom the coronal incision was objectionable, had intraoral malarplasty performed with 2-point fixation after L-shaped osteotomy involving the zygomatic process of maxilla, resulting in symmetric and aesthetically desirable three dimensional transposition of the malar bone.