Heavy Meson Hyperfine Splitting: A Complete $1/m_Q$ Calculation

The hyperfine splittings $\Delta_D=(m_{D^*_s}-m_{D_s})-(m_{D^{*+}}-m_{D^+})$ and $\Delta_B=(m_{B^*_s}-m_{B_s})-(m_{B^{*0}}-m_{B^0})$ are analyzed in the framework of an effective lagrangian possessing chiral, heavy flavour and spin symmetries, explicitly broken by a complete set of first order terms. Among these terms, those responsible for the difference between the couplings $\gis$ and $\gi$ are evaluated in the QCD sum rules approach. Their contribution to $\Delta_D$ and to $\Delta_B$ appears to quantitatively balance previously estimated chiral effects nice agreement with the experimental data, solving a suspected puzzle for heavy quark theory.