Effects of short-term motor training on accuracy and precision of simple jaw and finger movements after orthodontic treatment and orthognathic surgery: A case-control study

Abstract

Background: Orthognathic surgery has been performed with increasing frequency for the treatment of severe malocclusion, yet the postsurgical neuromuscular recovery of patients has been inadequately studied. Objective: To investigate the effect of short-term and simple jaw motor training on accuracy and precision of jaw motor control in patients following orthodontic treatment and orthognathic surgery. Methods: Twenty patients who had completed preoperative orthodontics, 20 patients who had undergone bimaxillary orthognathic surgery and 20 age-and-gender-matched healthy controls participated in the study. Participants were asked to perform 10 continuous jaw opening and finger lifting movements before and after a 30-min motor training session. The variability in the amplitude of these simple movements was expressed as percentage in relation to the target position (accuracy – Daccu) and as coefficient of variation (precision – CVprec) to describe the motor performance. Furthermore, the changes in amplitude before and after training were measured in percentage. Results: Daccu and CVprec of simple jaw and finger movements significantly decreased after motor training (p ≤.018) in all groups. The relative changes in finger movements were higher than jaw movements (p