Craniofacial growth in clefting from one month to ten years as studied by P-A headfilms.

Craniofacial growth of 64 children with a unilateral cleft of lip and palate, 32 children with a bilateral cleft of lip and palate, and 78 children with a cleft of palate only were studied at the ages of one month, three months, six months, one year, 18 months, two years, and annually till the age of 10 years. Nine width and 12 height measurements are obtained from the tracings of p-a X-ray headfilms and analysed. It was found that the cleft type differences were mainly restricted to the base line width, interorbital width, optic foramen width, basal maxillary width, interorbital height, optic foramen height, and gonial height. For all these measurements except basal maxillary width, the means are in the order BCLP greater than UCLP greater than CPO. For basal maxillary breadth it was UCLP greater than BCLP greater than CPO. Sex differences are restricted to base line width, basal maxillary width, bizygomatic width, interorbital height, and optic foramen height. For these width measurements, males have larger means than females. For the height measurements, females have larger means than males.