Objective: To compare the complementation of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to prenatal ultrasound (US) with prenatal US alone in detecting orofacial clefts in high-risk fetuses.
Design: A network meta-analysis.
Setting: Literature retrieval in PubMed, EMBASE, and Cochrane library, and meta-analysis based on STATA 14.0.
Patients: Fetuses were at high-risk for orofacial clefts.
Interventions: Prenatal US and the complementation of MRI to prenatal US.
Main outcome measures: The pooled sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), negative predictive value (NPV), diagnostic odds ratio (DOR), and area under the curve (AUC).
Results: Thirteen studies involving 776 patients were included. Direct meta-analysis showed that the complementation of MRI to prenatal US did not differ from prenatal US in detecting orofacial clefts if the type of orofacial clefts was not distinguished. Subgroup analysis showed that the specificity of prenatal US for the detection of isolated cleft palate (CP) was lower than that of the complementation of MRI to prenatal US. Furthermore, network meta-analysis consistently suggested a comparable diagnostic value between prenatal US and the complementation of MRI to prenatal US. Moreover, subgroup analysis showed that the specificity of prenatal US was significantly lower than that of complementation of MRI to prenatal US for the detection of isolated CP.
Conclusions: MRI is more accurate than ultrasound in detecting cleft palate. Therefore, MRI should be offered if there is a fetus with a possible or ultrasound diagnosis of cleft palate, especially if the evaluation of cleft palate is deemed unsatisfactory after careful evaluation of the images.
Keywords: cleft palate; fetal development; magnetic resonance imaging; ultrasound.