Presurgical Cleft Management of Infants: A Survey of ACPA Approved and International Cleft Palate and Craniofacial Teams.

Objective: To characterize the presurgical infant orthopedics (PSIO) and gingivoperiosteoplasty (GPP) protocols across the American Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Association (ACPA) approved and international cleft palate (CP) and craniofacial teams.

Design: Cross-sectional survey.

Setting: ACPA approved and international CP and craniofacial teams.

Results: Respondents from 115 out of 215 ACPA approved and international CP and craniofacial teams permitted to contact (out of a total of 259 total teams) completed the survey (response rate  =  53.5%). There were 89 (77.4%) ACPA approved teams and the remaining international teams were mainly located in Europe (13.0%). Seventy-eight CP and craniofacial teams (67.8%) provided PSIO and 65 (83.3%) of these teams used alveolar molding (AM). Twenty-two CP and craniofacial teams (19.1%) provided GPP. A mean of 9.5  ±  2.6 different specialists were on the cleft team with the most common being orthodontists (97.4%), speech therapists (96.5%), and plastic/craniofacial surgeons (90.4%).

Conclusions: Most ACPA approved and ACPA registered international CP and craniofacial teams provided PSIO techniques by orthodontists using lip taping (LT) and AM, while few provide GPP.