This retrospective study comprised 2,081 patients with maxillofacial trauma sustained in various accidents and treated in the Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery at the Soon Chun Hyang University Hospital between July 1978 and June 1987.
Although the etiology of facial injuries varies from one geographical area another according to the development and type of the prevalent transportation system, car accidents probably cause more facial injuries than any other modality in most modern countries.
Frequently, the patient with a face injury has concomitant injuries of several organ system. The timely diagnosis and initial treatment of these associated injuries, combined with the need for careful sequential planning, may require a highly sophisticated consideration of the total medical situation in the patient.
The following results were obtained.
1) An increase of facial injuries of 23% per year was noted. September and July (13.3 c/o, 12.5 %) were associated with the highest incidence rates between 6:00 p.m. and midnight.
2) The extremes of age in the study range from 1 year to 66 years with a mean 31.5 years. Predictably, most of the injuries occured in young males with the highest incidence in the 20 to 30 year age group. Male predominanted more than female, 2.8:1.
3) The moving vehicle accidents (49.5 %) were responsible for the majority of trauma; the interpersonal violence (21.4 %) was the next most common cause.
4) Types of maxillofacial trauma were facial bone fractures (28.4 %) and facial soft tissue injuries (71.6 %).
5) A total of 912 classified facial fractures were diagnosed in the 592 patients. In our patients, the most common fractures were found in the mandible followed by nose, zygoma, maxilla, and orbital rim.
6) The most common facial soft tissue injuries were facial laceration (60.5 %) follow
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