How Safe Are Titanium Fixation Pins for Contouring Surgery?

Hello, I’m Dr. Jo Hyun-woo of Ipcheok Plastic Surgery.

I’ve talked before about the fixation pins used in facial contouring surgery.

Titanium has the advantage of being harmless to the human body, so it is also used in cardiovascular surgery and, more commonly, in a wide range of applications such as dental implants.

However, because it is a foreign material, it has the drawback of potentially causing inflammation.

Today, let’s look at what kinds of titanium there are and what other side effects may occur.

First, let’s examine the components of the fixation pins used in contouring surgery.

This table is an import inspection report for titanium fixation pins.

F136 is the material number for titanium that has been approved for medical use.

They compare whether the components match the approved formula and whether the ingredients in the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety component list and the certificate match, then determine whether it is the F136 material for medical devices and import it accordingly.

This was something I learned newly: titanium fixation pins were not 100% titanium.

They are said to be an alloy of 98% titanium with aluminum, iron, vanadium, and molybdenum.

All of these are harmless to the human body, and the proportion of titanium used in dental implants is said to be slightly higher.

When I looked through the papers, I found a study reporting that allergic reactions rarely occurred with dental implants.

This is a paper written in Spain.

It says that because of a phenomenon called tribocorrosion in titanium, inflammatory reactions can occur and bone loss may happen.

These are the allergic reactions the authors found in various papers.

A wide range of allergic reactions can occur, such as redness, itching, facial swelling, and pain, and these papers are reported as case reports (rare cases).

However, the probability is extremely low, and in conclusion, the symptoms disappeared after these dental implants were removed.

(Left) Titanium for dental implants, (Right) Titanium plate for contouring surgery

I honestly had never even considered that titanium pins could cause allergies until I read these papers.

When I asked dentists, they said they had rarely, if ever, seen such cases.

But seeing cases like these makes it seem possible that an allergic reaction could occur, even if the probability is only 0.001%.

Among these patients, many already had metal allergies.

Therefore, if you already have a metal allergy, it may be helpful to know that there is a slight possibility of an allergic reaction caused by a titanium plate.

However, even that possibility is said to be very low.

Today, we looked into titanium fixation pins, which are known to be harmless to the human body.

In fact, because there are various companies that make titanium fixation pins, I tried to look into which material is better, but since they are imported based on items registered with the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety, it does not seem that their properties differ by company.

If redness, itching, or facial swelling occurs after using titanium fixation pins, it may be a good idea to consider removing the fixation pins after the bone has fully healed.

Thank you.