The distraction of the mandible through growing new bone to lengthen the mandible has been proven to be an effective method for correcting growing mandibles. But, what about using the distraction device as an alternative to distract the adult mandible? We performed a retrospective clinical study on 38 adult patients in the Helios Kliniken Schwerin. The study's purpose was to prove that bilateral distraction osteogenesis could be used as an alternative to bilateral sagittal split osteotomy.