[Etiology of lip defects]

Lips repair cannot be considered until the characteristics of the loss of substance which are given by its aetiology, has been carefully determined. Traumatic aetiologies remain dominated by accidents on the public roads associated more often with adjacent damage. Dog bites remain the burden of children and always raise the problem of their septicity. For burns there is a need to wait for the organism to delimit its own viable tissues. Ballistic traumatisms will lead to major damage where functional repair to the lips can often be very difficult. Tumours of the lips, essentially malignant, lead to wide exeresis, where the margins are dictated by histological findings. They, of course, pose the problem of eventual neck node dissection and are dominated by squamous cell carcinomas.