E. O. Anighoro et al. / Open Journal of Stomatology 3 (2013) 527-532 531
age from the wound in the primary closure group. This
may be responsible for the differences noted.
Comparison of the differences between the 1st, 3rd and
7th postoperative day reviews showed no statistical dif-
ference between the two groups. It also showed that by
the 7th day the facial swelling had virtually resolved.
Swelling seemed to be at its maximum on the 3rd postop-
erative day followed by a slow reduction over the subse-
quent days (Ta b l e 2 ). This finding is in agreement with
some previous researchers [11,26,27] who all reported
maximal facial swelling at 72 hours. However, some other
studies reported maximal swelling at 48 hours postopera-
tively [13,22]. The differences may be due to variation in
individual inflammatory responses.
An overall complication rate of 5% was recorded in
this study which was within the range recorded in litera-
ture [7]. The complication rate in both groups was equal
in consonance with previous studies in literature [4,18].
This might imply that wound closure methods have little
or no effect on the rate of complications after the third
molar removal.
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