Leaps forward during surgery on a broken jaw

It’s a profession that rose to prominence during World War I, responsible for nearly 50,000 soldiers disfigured by bullets and shrapnel. “This high number of broken mouths was a surprise and nothing was imagined for their care in terms of rehabilitationexplains Sophie Delaporte, historian, lecturer at Picardy-Jules-Verne University (Amiens) and author of the book. faces of war (Belin Editions, 2017). Therefore, it is general surgeons who have transformed the techniques of general surgery to try to restore the skeleton and the facial envelope so that these men can breathe, eat, communicate again. Maxillofacial surgery disappeared between the wars and reappeared at the end of World War II, notably thanks to two surgeons, Léon Dufourmentel and Maurice Virenck, and the birth of the first maxillofacial surgery department in 1946.