My DS15 has an underbite and is going to start wearing braces next summer followed by jaw surgery two years later. We had a long chat with an NHS orthodontist and jaw surgeon last week, who reassured us that the surgery has a 95% success rate and the only risk was a 5% chance of a small numb area remaining that usually subsides.
Today I came across an article about orthotropics and how it is never mentioned by the NHS as an alternative to jaw surgery. I ended up calling the practice run by the son of the founder, Mike Mew, and he said if I had been told about this back when my son was first diagnosed with an underbite at eight years, orthotropic treatment would have been simple, relatively inexpensive and successful. At 15 it's going to cost about £15,000 and my DS will need much more complex treatment but with a lower chance of success.
The main reason I'm considering it is that Mike Mew said that jaw surgery relapses in almost 50% of cases and the operation has a higher risk of fatality than other operations because of all the nerve endings involved! I specifically asked about risk at my NHS appointment and they didn't say anything about this.
I wondered if anyone on here has had experience of orthotropics. I'm particularly keen to hear from @CarGirl, who posted back in 2009 that her DD had successful orthotropic treatment and she only paid a small private cost and had the rest done on the NHS.