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Establishment of Objective Clinical Parameters for Assessment of Trigonocephaly: Are Caliper-Derived Clinical
Yufan Yan1, Jennifer L McGrath, Lindsay E Janes
1Division of Plastic Surgery, Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago; Feinberg School of Medicine of Northwestern University, Chicago, IL.
Objective:
Objective clinical parameters characterizing the severity of trigonocephaly are essential given the concern for computerized tomography (CT) scans and radiation in infants. The present study seeks to develop a clinical tool by which to characterize trigonocephaly.
Design:
Retrospective cohort study.
Setting:
Tertiary academically affiliated children's medical center.
Participants:
A retrospective review identified patients with trigonocephaly for whom surgery was recommended (group 1) and those with metopic ridging without significant trigonocephaly (group 2). Normal age-matched controls were also evaluated (group 3).
Interventions:
Cranial vault caliper measurements were compared across groups. Two ratios measuring anterior vault constriction were developed: (1) bitemporal width at the mid-forehead to the biparietal width, and (2) bitemporal width at the lateral brow to the biparietal width.
Main Outcome Measures:
Bitemporal width to biparietal width (ratio).
Results:
Caliper measures were obtained from 19 patients in group 1, 8 patients in group 2, and 19 patients in group 3 (controls). Cranial indices were not significantly different across groups. The bitemporal width at the mid-forehead to the biparietal width ratio was significantly lower in group 1, with no difference between groups 2 and 3. The bitemporal width at the lateral brow to the biparietal width ratio was significantly different between all 3 groups, with group 1 < group 2 < group 3, respectively.
Conclusions:
Bitemporal to biparietal ratios are a quantitative, objective clinical measure that can be used to differentiate patients with significant trigonocephaly from those with metopic ridging but no significant cranial deformity. These findings suggest that caliper-derived indices can assist in characterizing surgically relevant cranial vault deformities secondary to metopic synostosis and may circumvent CT-based analysis.
