Three-Dimensional Quantification of Postoperative Facial Asymmetry in Patients With Unilateral Cleft lip and Palate Using Facial Symmetry Plane.

OBJECTIVE: To quantitatively assess three-dimensional (3D) soft tissue facial asymmetry in patients with unilateral cleft lip and palate (UCLP) who have undergone primary lip repair. DESIGN: Clinical, retrospective, comparative, methodological study. PATIENTS/PARTICIPANTS: Twenty patients with UCLP were selected after a review of the records. INCLUSION CRITERIA: Complete UCLP; surgically treated without secondary repair. An age-matched and sex-matched Control group was employed. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: A 3D facial symmetry plane (FSP) was obtained by superimposing the point clouds of the original 3D facial image excluding the surgical site and including lip and nose areas and those of a mirrored facial image using the iterative closest point (ICP) adjustment method. The discrepancies in the depth and angle of the normal vector of the facial surface of each point cloud between right and left sides (cleft and non-cleft sides in the UCLP group, respectively) based on FSP were calculated. RESULTS: Facial asymmetry in the UCLP group was significantly greater than in the Control group regarding both the discrepancies in the depth (1.34 ± 0.62, 0.73 ± 0.32 pixels, respectively) (P = .0004) and surface angle (18.0 ± 5.88, 12.8 ± 4.0°, respectively) (P = .0024). Biaxial assessment of the discrepancies in the depth and surface angle allowed us to visually extract UCLP patients with greater facial asymmetry. CONCLUSIONS: Facial asymmetry analysis based on 3D FSP effectively facilitates the facial asymmetry quantification and soft tissue surgical outcome evaluation in patients with UCLP.

Using three-dimensional nasal forms to compare definitive unilateral cleft lip nose correction with/without a cross-lap joint cartilage graft technique.

To compare three-dimensional (3D) nasal forms after definitive correction of unilateral cleft lip (UCL)-nose using an extended spreader cartilage graft with/without a cross-lap joint cartilage graft technique. Twenty-four patients with UCL who underwent definitive nose correction using an extended spreader cartilage graft with a cross-lap joint technique (CLJ group) and fifteen patients with UCL who underwent nose correction without a cross-lap joint technique (non-CLJ group) were enrolled in this study. Pre- and postoperative 3D nasal forms were compared between the two groups. The CLJ group demonstrated more successful recovery of the nasal tip and anterior nasal ridge in the center of the face (P < 0.01), and the higher nasal tip was maintained for more than 1 year (P = 0.008). The differences in the cephalo-caudal heights of the nasal alar groove and curvatures of the alar groove arch were successfully improved in both CLJ and non-CLJ groups. The nasal angles on lateral profiles did not change in either group. An extended spreader cartilage graft with a cross-lap joint technique facilitates satisfactory recovery of the nasal tip in the center of the face and a higher nasal tip, avoiding over-projection in the definitive correction of UCL-nose.