Intraoral or extraoral approach in oblique sliding osteotomy of the mandibular ramus. A cephalometric study.

Positional changes of the mandible after oblique sliding osteotomy of the mandibular rami were investigated by means of cephalometric analysis. The patient material comprised 40 patients. Twenty patients were operated upon using an extraoral approach and 20 were operated on using an intraoral approach. The patients were followed up with lateral cephalograms for 18 months after operation. In both groups, a posterior rotation of the mandible took place during the fixation period. This rotation gave a further retro-displacement of gnathion and a shortening of posterior facial height. The incidence of patients with considerable posterior rotation of the mandible was higher in the intraoral than in the extraoral group. The difference between the means of the changes in the mandibular plane angle (dEO = 4.9 degrees, dIO = 6.3 degrees) of the groups was, however, not statistically significant. Nor was there any significant difference in relapse between the two groups after release of the fixation.