Children with cleft lip or palate appear to have abnormal brain structures. Patients with cleft lip or palate may have intellectual deficits and reading disabilities may be as much as 10-times more common than in normal children. The discovery of an increased rate of abnormal brain development in individuals with cleft lip/palate is an important step toward understanding this complex human malformation. To gain further information on developments underlying the deficits, researchers from the University of Iowa Carver College of Medicine compared 74 affected children with a similar number of healthy children. Height was significantly less in the cleft lip/palate group, and after accounting for body size, the brains of these children were also found to be abnormally small. Learning and behaviour are not uncommon in these children, but they need to be closely monitored to detect problems and provide early intervention. A better understanding of the role of abnormal brain development in cleft lip/palate should help raise the level of awareness, in both health professionals and in families. However, further research is required to explore their functional impact.
Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine,
August 2007