Patient - Reconstruction

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Click on an image below to see a larger version.

Before

This lovely 14 year old young lady was very unhappy with her prominent ears. She had a typical bilateral lop ear deformity, which is due to a failure of the ear cartilage to fold properly, causing the ears to stand out from the head. Correction requires breaking the spring of the cartilage and place sutures that, when tied down, will fold the ear back against the head. It is important to avoid overdoing the correction otherwise the ears have a "pinned back" look to them (If you wish to see what this looks like, check out actor Kiefer Sutherland of 24 fame). It is not critical to get perfect symmetry because few ears are identical and they are never really seen from directly in front such that they can be compared. 

Here, you can see the absence of the fold on the front of the ears. 

In this view, you can see how the ear sticks almost straight out from the head. 

After

She was delighted with the improved, natural look of her ears. I was too!