Orthognathic Surgery and Tinnitus

Hello,
I wonder if there is anyone here who have undergone orthognathic surgery having had tinnitus at time.

I'm starting orthodontic treatment very soon and it is suggested that I have osteothomy Lefort1 done to have my bite corrected. I am really worried about possible implications of such serious surgery on my tinnitus. My T is quite loud now (constant, having spikes at times, especially when working out, jogging, or whenever lacking enough of sleep and when I am really stressed out).

I am well aware of oxidative stress bad impact on my tinnitus. Hence I am worried about the possible worsening impact of this procedure on my T while knowing that you loose approx. 0,5 -0,7 liter of blood, adding everything what I've read about risk caused by anaesthesia on the top of that makes me even more worried.

But before I even get there I should have all of my wisdom teeth removed (I've read some people here reporting having their T getting worse after wisdom teeth removal).

Anyone here has similar experiences and could share them with me? Any of your personal experiences with other surgeries and their impact on T are most welcome here as well.

Kindest regards

 

Hi Caren,
I'm under a maxillofacial specialist and I have been told I can have surgery on my crunching jaw and due back to see him in the next few months as was given 6 months to think about it.
It's been about 2-3 months since seen him so just waiting now and still not sure what to do.....lots of love glynis

 

Thank you Glynis for your reply,
I understand your concerns about the surgery. First-hand feedback from someone who's been through that would be really helpful here.. kindest regards, caren

 

Hey Caren,

I'm sorry if this comes too late. I temporarily left TT for a while to focus on school...


Here's a quick summary of my situation. My tinnitus started almost two years ago. The cause is probably acoustic trauma, just like yours. I played in a small room with a loud band, while wearing earplugs, and two days later the ringing started. Every doctor has told that I should've been fine, but somehow this is only direct cause I can point to.
I was also wearing braces and rubber bands at the time. My tinnitus does respond a bit to stress and sleep deprivation. Several ENT's and even a team of tinnitus specialists could not find a cause or cure.

I had my orthognathic surgery last Monday to correct a misaligned lower law. The surgeon said that they do this procedure regularly and never see any effect on anyone's hearing, which is what ultimately made me decide to go through with the treatment. Now, my lower jaw was narrowed and shortened slightly on one side, then rotated slightly. The operation went well and I am now at home recovering.
I was under general anesthesia and lost about 200mL of blood.

I was prescribed a box of Ibuprofen, but I am not taking them. I only took one on Tuesday, because I thought I had to too, but apparently I don't as long as the pain is bearable.

Since a couple of days, I have started to hear chirping sounds. I hope this is all temporary and caused by the stress my body is under: surgery, a lot of stress from school, depression, my dad who's basically stopped talking to me, drinking all these not-so-great-'liquid food'-things, being really sick today, wearing rubber bands again, neck and shoulder pain which was already there, sleeping in weird positions...


Two years a ago, about 2 to 3 months before my tinnitus started, I also underwent surgery on my teeth/jaw. I'll share this story as well if this could help you. I was born with two missing permanent teeth. Because of neglect by my parents and a dentist, I was sent to an orthodontist way too late to actually have a choice in the treatment.
By the time I went to an orthodontist, the primary teeth had grown stuck to the lower jaw bone and were way off from where they should be, this cause the rest of my (otherwise fine) teeth to become misaligned. This may have caused my jaw to be misaligned too, but it could also have grown this way 'naturally'.

In this earlier surgery, these two primary teeth were removed, two 'bone anchors' (metal pins) were inserted in my upper jaw (they are still there) to attach wires to to help the braces, and 'scratches' were made in my lower jaw to allow for more movement of the teeth during a certain period of time.

If I recall correctly, I got one week of tinnitus-hell exactly one week after the surgery. And then it went away... I did get another appointment with an ENT and the surgeon by the time the tinnitus had somewhat subsided, but neither could identify the cause and told me there was nothing they could do.


If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask. I'll be happy to try to help someone in a similar situation.

 

Hey Walkthroughwalls,

Thank you so much for sharing your story. This really comes in handy at this point.
I am sorry for all of this post-op stress that you are going through... I hope you are recovering and are doing way better by now after your surgery.

So how are you doing? How is your tinnitus at this point? Have these chirping sounds gone away so far? If no, are they bearable for you?

Did the surgery affect your T in any other way? Did you notice any increase in loudness or any new frequency right after surgery? If you had to make the decision once again, would you go with the surgery again?

In all honesty, I am impressed to hear that you decided to go with it, considering all the doubts that I had myself.

In the meaintime, I've gone through some other procedure two weeks ago. I had my deviated septum corrected. Procedure was done under local anaesthesia and it also went well. I haven't noticed any increase in level of my T at any point. This plus some other considerations made me decide to go with my jaw surgery, I will be seing my surgeon next week to schedule it (I assume it will be done no earlier than by the end of 2017 as there are huge queues for these procedures in public healthcare).
Still next month I will be removing 2 of my wisdoom theeth, I am curious how it will go.

It's very interesting what you're writing. It never happened to me to experience a tinnitus-related implications with such a delay. In my case my T is usually affected right after significant event and I need like 2-3 days to let it go down to it's usual level. For me these events are severe sleep deprivations, being under stress for a longer period of times and last but not least, being for a long time in loud places (I do wedding photography together with my brother, but this year I decided that I will no longer be coverng wedding-party itself due to T. It's way to dangerous, even with earplugs, as you're in a very loud place, focused all the time and it's very exausting activity - best receipe for worsening your T..)

Wishing you all the best in your recovery!
Caren

 

Hi Caren,

I'm glad my message was of any use to you!

Thanks for asking how I am. To be honest, I'm not feeling very good, but a lot of it is unrelated to the surgery. The chirping sounds have gone away, but I still hear a new tone. It's not horrible, but it's still quite annoying. Mainly when I'm trying to sleep or read. I still think there's a good chance it will go away once I'm fully recovered. If it doesn't, I should be able to habituate to it fairly easily.

Right after the surgery I noticed no effect on my tinnitus at all. Absolutely none.
What I'm hearing now may be solely caused by stress, my irregular sleep pattern, unusual sleeping positions etc.. Five days ago I went back to the hospital for a scheduled check-up and the surgeon couldn't find any complications. The tinnitus may be because there's some movement where the jaw connects the the rest of the skull (near the ears). This should settle in a few weeks. I'm now wearing rubber bands diagonally to move my jaw slightly to its ideal position.


It's hard to say whether I would have the operation again at this point. I'm still recovering and feeling all of the temporary negative effects and none of the positive (which may not happen until years into the future).
If I had the chance to do something again, I would have insisted on having a say in which path to choose from when I was ten years old and onwards, instead of being forced into something by my parents and one dentist. Then all of this could probably have been avoided.

You say that you were impressed that I decided to go through with it all. Well, to be honest... Once I was in a hospital bed being wheeled towards the operating room, I was quite nervous and couldn't tell whether I was brave, wise or just plain stupid. Wasn't this all just a big gamble? Keep in mind that I had to go against a couple of horror stories on here and my family disapproved of my choice as well...

Here's was ultimately made me go through with the procedure:
- it was recommended by two orthodontists and two surgeons (my advice: get second opinions),
- I wanted to `get this right, now' and not gamble on the future (my advice: think long term),
- these procedures were regularly performed in this hospital and by the surgeon and they never noticed any effects on anyone's hearing (my advice: ask the surgeons/staff how often they perform the exact procedure planned for you and how often one's hearing is affected).

I short, I seemed to be better off with the procedure and couldn't find any reliable source saying that specifically this procedure would put my hearing or tinnitus at risk. And given this, and that nothing horrible has happened yet, I would do it again.


Also, I talked to one of the nurses in the room before the operating room, and she said that some surgeons work while having music playing in the background. If fact, she said she refused to work with a particular surgeon because he'd always have the radio on ridiculously loud. You might want to check this with your surgeon.


It's only the last major increase that happened two days after the event, and that tinnitus spike one week after surgery. Otherwise, mine is exactly like yours. Sleep deprivation, stress and noise increase it immediately and it goes down in two or three days.

What a pity that you had to give up photographing the wedding party Are they that loud?
My sister is getting married soon and asked me to take photographs during the party, as they will only have a professional photographer during the ceremony. I'm just an amateur photographer, mind you, but would like to help my sister out wherever I can.
At least there are plenty of other moments to photograph during weddings, right? It seems like quite a wonderful job, even though it can be quite stressful and exhausting.


Glad to hear the previous procedure went well. I wish you the best for the wisdom teeth removal and the osteotomy!

 

Hi Walkthroughtwalls,

My apologies for answering you with a delay. It's been a busy time for me recently.
It's good to hear that chirping sounds have gone away. I hope it will go the same way with the new tone that you can hear right now.

Thank you for all of the pre-surgery advices and other useful information. I've already asked the surgeon about the any negative effect of the surgery on one's hearing, he never experienced nor heard anything like that, but to be fair he said also that you ca never exclude any unusual not previously observed individual biological reactions on the procedure. He's an experienced maxillofacial surgeon and he performs double jaw surgeries pretty often. I haven't got the second opinion yet, I might consider doing that. Thanks.

When it comes to wedding photgraphy, my advice for you would be, if you want to help your sister, do it but, wear earplugs and if you feel you consider the music loud and when you feel you get tired, leave the party at this point.

Yesterday I was covering wedding with my brother, I wasn't suposed to stay during party but I did against my initial plan, because I considered the music not that loud. The same as you, I wanted to help out my brother, but at some point the dj put the music louder and that was a big mistake that I didn't leave at this point.

I went sleep with something I can describe as tinnitus hell - a loud, very bothering tinnitus, plus I could hear some new low frequency pith. The only thing I could think of myself was how stupid I was.
I woke up miserable, however the new pith was gone but the tinnitus was still loud. Not that loud as when I was falling asleep, but stil enought to trigger anxiety and disturb my day.
It's bit better now, I think I might be slowly heading toward my normal T level but I still need one or two nights of good sleep to see where it ends up.
I know, not very positive news.

So my advice once again is think about yourself and your health in the first place always.
I hope by the time I am writing this message you are much better recovering after the surgery.

All the best!