Identifying associations between dental arch relationship scores, relative deprivation and other cleft audit outcomes. Part 1

Abstract

Objectives: To assess whether dental arch relationship scores are associated with speech, audiological and psychology outcomes in patients with complete unilateral cleft lip and palate (UCLP) and bilateral cleft lip and palate (BCLP).

Setting and sample population: One hundred 5-year-old children with non-syndromic complete UCLP and forty-two 5-year-olds with non-syndromic complete BCLP from the United Kingdom.

Material and methods: Data were collected from five-year audit clinics for dental arch relationships, speech, hearing and psychology outcomes. Associations were assessed between ordinal prognostic covariates and the dental arch relationship outcome using a Cochrane-Armitage test for trend and comparisons with binary prognostic covariates using chi-square/Fisher's exact test. This was extended to assess associations between five-year audit outcomes and a measure of deprivation.

Results: There was no evidence of associations between dental arch relationships and outcomes for audiology and speech. Individual domain analysis of the psychology outcomes within the UCLP cohort reported a poor outcome for Pro-social score to be associated with a poor 5-year-old index score (P = .018). For the BCLP sample, a good outcome for the BCLP Deciduous Dentition Yardstick was associated with a good conduct score (P = .01).

Conclusion: There was no association with the 5-year-old index/BCLP Deciduous Dentition Yardstick score and outcomes reported for audiology and speech. For the UCLP and BCLP cohorts, a poor dental arch relationship outcome may be associated with issues with some aspects of psychological well-being, associated with peer interactions and conduct. The deprivation index of samples had no association with the outcomes assessed.

Keywords: cleft audit outcomes; dental arch relationships; deprivation; unilateral/bilateral cleft lip and palate.