Caractéristiques cranio-faciales chez un groupe de patients chiliens atteints de fente labio-maxillo-palatine unilatérale opérée

Abstract

Introduction. Craniofacial growth in cleft lip and palate patientsis controversial. Structural alterations of the face in these patientscould be due to the surgical treatment combined with the primaryvariations of the cranial base morphology. Our objective was to ana-lyze the morphology of the craniofacial skeleton in a group of uni-lateral cleft lip and palate Chilean patients.Material and method. We studied 43 non syndromic operatedunilateral complete cleft lip and palate patients. Ages ranged from10 to 18 years for both genders. This cohort was compared with acontrol group of 40 non cleft patients, matched for age and sex,using Delaire’s structural and architectural craniofacial analysis onlateral radiographs and performed by the same operator.Results. Cleft patients presented with significantly different con-figurations of the craniofacial skeleton, specifically a flatter basi-cranium, a reduced posterior maxillary height, a retrusive maxilladeficient in length with an associated crossbite.