Abstract
This study was designed to learn current treatment plans in Japan for lip, alveolus and palate cleft patients by means of questionnaire.
Questionnaires we r e collected from 54 medical institutions belonging to the Japanese Cleft Palate Association. Then treatment plan summaries were compared with the European and American plans of 30teams represented in the 1984 Zurich Symposium.
The results were as follows.
1. Presurgical orthopedics is done mostly routinely in the European and American teams, but only occasionally by the Japanese teams for cases with severe extending premaxilla.
2. Unilaterral cleft lip is closed by a Tennison or Millard procedure in Japan as well as in Europe and America.
3. Cleft palate is closed with push back procedure by most Japanese teams. On the other hand, the European and American teams use various operation methods such as Wardill procedure, von Lange n beck procedure, two-stage mucosal flap method and early veloplasty.
4. Speech monitoring and intensive speech therapy are done routinely in most Japanese teams.
5. The regular ENT monitoring is done in 24 out of 30 teams in Europe and America and only in 12 out of 52 teams in Japan.
6. Orthodontics in deciduous dentition is not done routinely in Europe and America as well an in Japan.
7. Secondary bone grafting is performed routinely in mixed dentition by most of European and American teams, and occasionally in permanent dentition by the Japanese teams.
