Long face

[vincent168]

What problem actually causes one's face to look abnormally long? Is it the lower jaw growing too much vertically? I wonder if single jaw surgery can correct this problem?

I looked up long face syndrome and it seems to be something different altogether. It looks like someone who has a receding chin and to me their face doesn't even look long.

[keeponsmiling]

For what I understand, it's when the upper jaw grows down too far, rather than the lower jaw. Very roughly, the distance from the bottom of your nose to the bottom of your chin should be the same (or perhaps slightly longer) than the distance from your hairline to brow and brow to bottom of your nose. Imagine you are dividing your face into three equal sections and that's supposed to be the 'ideal' ratio. In long face syndrome the bottom third will be proportionally too long. I don't fully understand the technicalities but I think that because the upper jaw has grown down too far it rotates the lower jaw into the wrong position, making it look receded and creating lip incompetence.

[sirwired]

Both the upper and lower jaws can be responsible for a long face.

[ReoSity]

There are variations of the syndrome between more often than not those diagnosed with it have vertical maxillary excess, meaning there upper grew too long and caused there lower jaw to rotate backwards and down. This usually results in having lip competence, retruded chin, excess incisor display at rest and gummy smile. Two jaw surgery (and sometimes genioplasty) is usually utilized to correct it.

[vincent168]

I'm very curious what my ortho would say. Is this something they would mention in the diagnosis consultation? Or it is only mentioned if questioned by the patient?

[asmileconnectsus]

Long face syndrome can be caused by many different factors. When I originally consulted my ortho they were able to diagnosis it...it was part of their thorough evaluation.