Christopher P Dehan, MD

Unfortunately I can’t give less than one star. Christopher Dehan operated on me when I had a tumor in my salivary gland over ten years ago. The surgery didn’t go well. Nerve damage is a known side effect of the surgery because the tumor can so engulf the nerve that they have to sever nerves to remove the tumor as a whole (if they cut the tumor, it increases the chance of regrowth). But that wasn’t the problem in my case. Dehan severed the trunk for my facial nerves before he ever got around to touching the tumor. After spending hours trying to find and correct his mistake, he gave up and called another doctor in to attempt to repair the damage and remove the tumor. The doctor he called in found at least part of the nerve damage, and grafted a sensory nerve from my earlobe to the facial nerve.
Dehan visited me exactly once after the surgery. He didn’t explain what had happened to me; he merely said «so I’m sure you heard what happened.» Then he referred me to an eye surgeon and left.
The reason for the reference was that I was unable to blink as a result of the nerve damage. The natural position for an eye is open, and it’s our eye muscles (controlled by our nerves) that allow us to blink. Because I had such extensive damage, I couldn’t even fully close my eye, much less regularly blink. I ended up having a gold weight inserted under my eyelid to assist me in closing my eye and blinking. For several months (until I regained some movement) I had to tape my eye shut at night to keep it from drying out completely.
After about six months (nerves grow very slowly) I started to get some twitching under my eye. I went back to the doctor that did the graft (I refused to see Dehan after the surgery), and got a prescription for physical therapy. I remember the visit well. The doctor told me «Chris will be thrilled to hear you are getting movement back.» I told him that he was not permitted under any circumstances to tell Dehan about my progress. When he asked why I told him that I wanted Dehan to wonder for the rest of his life whether he had permanently damaged my face. The doctor’s response (which I will never forget) was «Nobody’s perfect.»
Facial nerve physical therapy is interesting. They hook electrodes up to your face and shoulder, and then pulse electric shocks through them. It’s not comfortable, but on the fleshy parts of your face, like your cheek, it doesn’t hurt… unless they turn it up to high. That happened to me once. It made my jaw clamp down, unfortunately, with my tongue between my teeth. It wasn’t pretty. And when they put it on my forehead, it would feel like someone was hammering needles into my skull.
But the therapy helped, and I now have partial movement in the lower part of my face. I still have no movement above my eye, and only limited movement from the eye down, but at least it’s something. The long-​term consequences of the nerve damage are numerous. None of them are devastating, but combined, they are not fun. Nearly every day my eye hurts and waters because I can’t blink properly, When the weather changes, it gets worse. I have occasional days without any pain, but they are few and far between. My vision in the eye has also deteriorated as a result of the lack of proper lubrication. The muscles below my eye twitch constantly unless I get botox every four months to deaden those nerves. I don’t blink properly, and I have to use prescription drops to keep it lubricated. When I lie down on my right side, water runs out of the eye in a near constant stream. When I don’t use the drops, it waters even sitting or standing to the point that it washes off my eye makeup. My right cheek and eyebrow both sag, and I have a crooked smile. As I age, my face is getting typical wrinkles on one side, and odd ones on the other, exaggerating the asymmetry caused by Dehan’s mistake.
All in all, Dehan’s poor surgery skills have cost me a great deal of pain, and several thousand dollars. My ongoing expenses are about $ 300 a year (for botox and eye drops). Interestingly, he (and his practice) never charged me beyond what insurance covered for my visit and all of my follow-​up, so that surgery was basically free for me). I should feel lucky that the nerve graft at least partially worked. At least I can close my eye now.
Had Dehan admitted his mistake (or even had remotely acceptable bedside manner), I wouldn’t write a review. As it is, his lack of humanity makes me want to share my story with everyone. I probably have about one person a month ask me what’s wrong with my eye. I am not embarrassed to tell them, but I miss the days when I didn’t have to explain why I look the way I do. Do yourself a favor and don’t take a chance with him.