Do oral surgeons (I assume DDM or DDS) qualify to perform maxillofacial surgery?

I heard this somewhere and need to know if this is true, and if so, is their cosmetic surgical practice limited to the face.

Do oral surgeons (I assume DDM or DDS) qualify to perform maxillofacial surgery?
After graduating dentistry school, dentists may do a residency/further training to become an oromaxillofacial (OMF) surgeon. These surgeons do complex jaw and facial surgeries. At many trauma centers, they do take facial trauma call.





I have not heard that they perform cosmetic surgery, but I suppose it would not surprise me if some transitioned into that. They do not have formal training to do surgery outside the face.





However, state medical licensing may not specifically prevent them from doing surgery elsewhere on the body if they wanted to. For instance, it might be possible for them to take a weekend course on breast augmentation and then legally (but not ethically) do that procedure. I can not say that for sure, though.
Reply:A D.D.M. should be D.M.D. These three initals designates that the doctor you are seeing has graduated from a dental school. Most of the dentists that graduate today have D.D.S. behind their name. D.D.S. stand for Doctor of Dental Surgery. Just like M.D. stands for Medical Doctor. Many years ago when the first dental schools opened up some schools chose to award the D.D.S. degree or the D.M.D. degree. D.M.D. stand for Doctor of Medical Dentistry. This may be due to the fact that these schools had close ties to a medical school. Nowadays, a dental school is affiliated with a University and all of the curriculum is nearly identical at all of the dental schools. If you go to a dentist that has a D.D.S. or D.M.D. it does not really matter. Both degrees mean the same thing.

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