Androgyny Image
Androgyny Image

The outcomes of surgery for facial trauma vary between restoring the face to the appearance of normalcy to obvious malformation. Even a good outcome usually doesn't result in a perfect restoration of the pre-trauma features, leading to a dramatic difference in the way that person is perceived by others. This could include a shift in whether someone with stereotypically attractive male or female features is perceived as attractive following reconstruction, or even whether they are perceived to be stereotypically male or female at all. The bifurcation of this ten year old boy’s face as a result of post-operative  telecanthus is one example of how a patient could take on a split or undifferentiated personality by having part of the face appear confident and purposeful (conventionally male) and the other more passive (conventionally female).

One recent and noteworthy example of post traumatic facial reconstruction was the case of Isabelle Dinoire whose face was mangled by her pet dog. As her own facial tissue was beyond repair, her physicians decided to graft tissue consisting of almost an entire face from a donor. While Dinoire’s features resemble a woman’s more than a man’s, there is a strong hint of androgyny in her visage. This lack of gender differentiation is a result of the multitude of small variances between her postoperative condition and her original face which identified her gender clearly.

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Post Operative Facial Trauma

Androgyny ImageIsabelle Dinoire following reconstructive surgery for a dog bite.