The Effect of Earlier Bone Grafting, Prior to Orthodontic Treatment, on SWAG Ratings of Graft Outcomes.

OBJECTIVE: To compare the outcomes between 2 groups of patients with complete clefts treated with early secondary alveolar bone grafting (ABG) at 2 centers (5-7 years, before orthodontic intervention) and to a third group of patients treated at one of those centers (center 1) who had received later secondary ABG (8-10 years, after orthodontic intervention). DESIGN: Blind retrospective analysis of cleft site radiographs using Americleft Standardized Way to Assess Grafts (SWAG) scale. PATIENTS: A total of 99 patients with complete clefts from 2 North American cleft/craniofacial centers. INTERVENTIONS: Secondary ABG representing 2 protocols: early grafting at a mean age of 6.6 years prior to any orthodontic intervention, and later grafting at a mean age of 10.2 years following pregrafting orthodontic intervention. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Using occlusal radiographs, the SWAG scale from 0 (failed graft) to 6 (ideal) was used. Six trained, calibrated raters scored each radiograph twice, with the average of the 2 ratings used as the final score. Reliability was assessed using the weighted κ statistic. The significance of differences between groups was determined using the Kruskal-Wallis test and Dunn test for pairwise comparisons. RESULTS: Inter-rater reliability of SWAG method was good (0.631). Intra-rater reliability was excellent (0.817). There was a tendency for improved total graft outcome in the early grafted group from center 1 compared to the later grafted group with improvement being significantly different in only the coronal third of the early, preorthodontic grafted group. However, the difference was not statistically significant for the graft overall.

Long-Term Outcomes for Adult Patients With Cleft Lip and Palate.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate a single center's experience with adult patients who had cleft lip, cleft palate, or both. The authors aimed to identify common long-term needs in this patient population and evaluated the relationship of team-based care in meeting those needs. To do so, the authors retrospectively reviewed chart records from a single private practice and tertiary referral cleft center for all patients who were ≥15 years of age and who had a history of clefts of the lip or palate, or both, from January 1, 2013, to June 30, 2014. The authors compared the concerns of the patients who received cleft-team-based care by a single, multidisciplinary cleft team; multiple multidisciplinary cleft teams; or no formal cleft team. The authors analyzed data for 142 patients. The most common patient concerns were lip aesthetics (64%), nose aesthetics (61%), septal deviations (47%), nasal obstruction (44%), malocclusion (32%), oronasal fistulas (29%), and speech (21%). Oronasal fistulas were more commonly reported in the group of patients who had care by multiple teams (42.9%; P < .001). Malocclusion was more commonly reported in the group of patients who had care by multiple teams (50%; P = .001). The authors found that adult patients who have undergone rehabilitation for cleft lip and palate appear to have a common set of long-term needs. Multidisciplinary cleft-team-based care appears to be the most effective way to address these needs.