Can I Get Mouth Reduction Surgery?

Q: Dr. Eppley, I want to inquire about mouth reduction surgery. It is very wide when smiling.  

A:Two important issues about mouth reduction:

1)  The scars for mouth reduction are not good and I would be very cautious about ever doing it as a result. You will likely make the adverse aesthetic tradeoff of a problem you dislike just as much or worse than the problem you are trying to improve,

2) You never do a static operation for a dynamic problem. Any surgery works best when the problem being treated is best seen static (non-smiling) as that is how the surgery is performed.

Dr. Barry Eppley

World-Renowned Plastic Surgeon