Three-dimensional analysis of the relationship between nasal morphological changes and maxillary movement

The purpose of this study was to assess the impact of the type of maxillary mobilization on the three-dimensional (3D) nasal morphology and the correlation between nasal changes and maxillary movement. Pre-surgery and post-surgery CBCT scans and 3dMD photos of twenty-nine patients who received Le Fort I osteotomy were obtained. The voxel-based registration method in Dolphin software was used for superimposition. The movement direction of the maxilla on the sagittal plane was divided into three groups: anterosuperior, anteroinferior, posterosuperior, and posteroinferior. The differences in nasal soft tissue morphology before and after surgery among each group and the effect of different directions of maxillary movement on the changes in 3D nasal morphology were analyzed. Significant increases in alar width and alar base width were observed when the maxilla was moved in the anterosuperior, posterosuperior, and anteroinferior directions (p < 0.05). Moving the maxilla in the anterosuperior and anteroinferior directions resulted in significant increases in nasal labial angle (NLA) and nasal tip rotation (NTR), and a significant decrease in nasal frontal angle (NFA) (p < 0.05). The changes in nasal morphology increase as the amount of maxillary anterior movement increases.