Abstract
Dental care for a Japanese boy with anhidrotic ectodermal dysplasia was performed from the age of 5 year-4 month to adulthood. The process of the dental care and the longitudinal change of the cranio-facial growth of this patient were studied. The patient had bilateral upper and lower primary canines which were peg teeth. His functional and esthetical problems were improved by wearing partial dentures, but both lower primary canines were lost by abnormal eruption or traumatic injury during the course of the dental care. The upper primary canines were restored using resin jacket crowns for correction of the crown form, and an overdenture for the upper jaw and a full denture for the lower jaw were worn.
The diagnoses of the occlusal height were made by linear analyses of the X-ray cephalometry, which comprised measurement of the dimension of each part of the facial bones on the co-ordinates. Since the height of the lower face was low due to absence of the alveolar processes, that should have been corrected by the dentures so as to improve the proportion of height of the facial bones. In particular, the acceptable occlusal height of the patient was maintained throughout the dental care by adjusting the ratio of the height of the lower face and the posterior portion or upper face.
Furthermore, a retrospective analysis for the cranio-facial growth was performed regarding the linear analysis values and the growth ratios. When the height and the growth ratio of the posterior portion of this patient were compared with the average Japanese children, they were smaller than the average. The growth ratio of the height and depth of the upper basal arch, and that of the depth of the lower basal arch were different from the average, but the growth ratios in other parts of the face were similar to the average, while the actual dimensions were smaller than the average.
