Height-weight growth of cleft children, birth to six years.

A study was conducted on 279 patients from the longitudinal patient series at the Institue to determine the general physical growth of cleft children using height and weight measurements. The objectives were to determine if severity of cleft type and sex in relation to severity of cleft type significantly affected height and weight and to determine if the height and weight of cleft children vary significantly from the non-cleft norm. The results showed that severity of cleft type is not significant while sex in relation to cleft type may be significant in several instances. It was also found that cleft children are neither consistently shorter nor consistenely lighter than the norm. An early lag period occurred, but by three years cleft children catch-up to the norm and rebound to growth equality, thus appearing to conform to the concept of catch-up growth.