BIRTH-WEIGHT, BODY LENGTH, AND CRANIAL CIRCUMFERENCE IN NEWBORNS WITHCLEFT-LIP OR PALATE

Objective: This paper reports on birth weight, body length, body mass index, and cranial circumference art birth of infants with cleft lip a nd/or palate born between 1973 and 1992. Methods: Data were obtained f rom two nationwide Swedish health registries. Infants with syndromes, twins, and infants with immigrant parentage were excluded from the stu dy. Comparisons were made with all singleton births with the same excl usion criteria (n = 2,031,140). Results: The body dimensions of infant s with isolated cleft lip (n = 865) were found not to differ from thos e of control subjects, but infants with isolated cleft palate (n = 811 ) or cleft lip and palate (n = 1139) were found to be lighter and shor ter than control subjects. Also, infants with the Pierre Robin sequenc e (n = 121) had a tendency to be lighter and shorter than control subj ects, but these differences did not reach statistical significance des pite the large study population.