Achieved chin position after genioplasty follows the planned horizontal change better than the planned vertical change

PurposeThe soft-tissue pogonion closely follows changes of the bony pogonion, but it is unknown how often an augmented bony pogonion reaches the intended position. Here we assessed the agreement between planned surgical changes and achieved results in chin surgery.Materials and methodsSurgical treatment was planned based on clinical examination, cast model analysis, and cephalometric image analysis. The mobile chin segment was stabilized using one chin plate. Preoperative and postoperative cephalometric X-ray images were digitized, and cephalometric tracing was performed. We calculated and analyzed the changes between the preoperative and postoperative images as well as between planned genioplasty movements and actual surgical changes in the horizontal and vertical directions.ResultsThis study included 36 patients. In 34 patients, the absolute mean horizontal difference was less than 2 mm. We found a higher range of absolute error in vertical (0.00-5.60) compared to horizontal (0.01-3.64) movement. There was no significant difference between the mean planned chin movement and the mean achieved position with regard to the horizontal and vertical movement (p = 0.97 and 0.79, respectively).ConclusionsThe mean values for linear difference in both the horizontal and vertical directions were in line with the acceptable mean of ≤2 mm proposed in the literature.