Retrospective Clinical Study of Maxillary Sagittal Fractures: Predictors of Postoperative Outcome

Because of less attention to the sagittal component of maxillary fractures, these fractures are often misdiagnosed or the reduction is missed leading to maxillary transverse discrepancies. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to identify factors associated with good or adverse postoperative outcomes of maxillary sagittal fractures.

This study was a single-center retrospective cohort study. The sample was composed of cases of maxillary sagittal fractures treated at the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Craniomaxillofacial Trauma Unit of Xi'an Jiaotong University (Xi'an, China) from January 2008 through December 2013. The predictor variables were age, gender, occupation, cause of injury, injury severity, treatment timing, treatment method, and quality of fracture reduction. The outcome variable was the postoperative treatment effect index. Descriptive, bivariate, and multivariate statistics were computed. The P value was set to .05.

The sample was composed of 40 cases. The male-to-female ratio was 4:1; the most vulnerable age group was 20 to 30 years (30%); laborers (72.5%) were more prone to injury; and the main cause of injury was motor vehicle accident (62.5%). No cases of isolated sagittal fracture were found and most (35%) occurred with other maxillary fractures, including Le Fort fractures. A statistically significant association between treatment timing and quality of fracture reduction and the postoperative treatment effect index (P < .05) was found.

The results of this study suggest that better results are achieved when fractured bone is treated sooner. Anatomic repositioning of the fractured bone is the important predictor for good postoperative outcomes.