Long face syndrome, also referred to as skeletal open bite, is a relatively common condition characterised by excessive vertical facial development. Its causes may be either genetic or environmental. Long face syndrome is "a common dentofacial abnormality." Its diagnosis, symptomology and treatments are complex and controversial. Indeed, even its existence as a "syndrome" is disputed.

Definition and treatment

One dental textbook defines it as: "Dolicofacial, there is excess of lower facial height usually associated with lower occlusal and mandibular plane angles." This is often associated "with vertical maxillary excess and

mandibular hypoplasia Micrognathism is a condition where the jaw is undersized. It is also sometimes called mandibular hypoplasia. It is common in infants, but is usually self-corrected during growth, due to the jaws' increasing in size. It may be a cause of abnorma ...

." Luc P. M. Tourne, a Fellow in the Department of TMJ and Craniofacial Pain at the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

School of Dentistry, noted: "There is a clinically recognizable facial morphology, the long face syndrome, which has been incompletely described in the literature," However, her study of 31 adults with this syndrome, which included "analysis of esthetics, skeletal morphology, and occlusion" confirmed "this basic dentofacial deformity" has associations " with excessive vertical growth of the maxilla." She reported that "closed bite" and "dental open" are two of the syndrome's variants. The treatment for young patients troubled by long face syndrome is to halt and control descent of the

lower jaw In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movable bone ...

and to prevent the eruption of

posterior teeth {{unreferenced, date=November 2015 In dentistry, the term posterior teeth usually refers as a group to the premolars and molars, as distinguished from the anterior teeth, which are the incisors and canine teeth. The distinction is one of anterior ( ...

. In severe cases of deformity, a mixture of

orthodontics Orthodontics is a dentistry specialty that addresses the diagnosis, prevention, management, and correction of mal-positioned teeth and jaws, and misaligned bite patterns. It may also address the modification of facial growth, known as dentofacial ...

and

orthognathic surgery Orthognathic surgery (), also known as corrective jaw surgery or simply jaw surgery, is surgery designed to correct conditions of the jaw and lower face related to structure, growth, airway issues including sleep apnea, TMJ disorders, malocclusion ...

may be the only effective solution. The long-term (more than 6 years) effectiveness of surgical treatments for long face syndrome has been subject to study. "In the American literature, the terms long-face syndrome and short-face syndrome are often used." To be sure, there are reported "long and short face anomalies" and open bite cases. However, in the opinion of Hugo Obwegeser, there is no medical justification for naming them as a "

syndrome A syndrome is a set of medical signs and symptoms which are correlated with each other and often associated with a particular disease or disorder. The word derives from the Greek σύνδρομον, meaning "concurrence". When a syndrome is paired ...

"—the signs and symptoms do not meet the definitional threshold. There is controversy concerning the use of the descriptor "long-face syndrome." While increased anterior "total and lower face height" in many ages, combined with vertical maxillary excess in adults has been observed, the causes are controversial. Specifically, there is disagreement about possible potential environmental influences on genetic components. Anecdotally, it was said to be a genetic condition, which could only be corrected with "massive amounts" of debilitating, frequent and long dental and facial reconstructive surgery. In children, there is a concern that

mouth breathing Mouth breathing, medically known as chronic oral ventilation, is long-term breathing through the mouth. It often is caused by an obstruction to breathing through the nose, the innate breathing organ in the human body. Chronic mouth breathing ma ...

can contribute to the development of long face syndrome. A recent study finds that it is a growing problem which should be treated as "it won't just go away." In addition to mouth breathing, it may be associated with

sleep apnea Sleep apnea, also spelled sleep apnoea, is a sleep disorder in which pauses in breathing or periods of shallow breathing during sleep occur more often than normal. Each pause can last for a few seconds to a few minutes and they happen many times ...

. Because of long face syndrome's sometime association with

pediatric Pediatrics ( also spelled ''paediatrics'' or ''pædiatrics'') is the branch of medicine that involves the medical care of infants, children, adolescents, and young adults. In the United Kingdom, paediatrics covers many of their youth until the ...

obstructive sleep apnea Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is the most common sleep-related breathing disorder and is characterized by recurrent episodes of complete or partial obstruction of the upper airway leading to reduced or absent breathing during sleep. These episod ...

(OSA) and allergic reactions, it is essential that treating physicians differentiate the conditions and the treatments; treating one may not cure the other.

Notable people

Actor and screenwriter

Craig Chester Craig Chester (born November 8, 1965) is an American actor, writer, and screenwriter. Early life Chester was born in West Covina, California, the son of Cecil, lead singer in the rock band “Whiskey”, and Linda, a homemaker. He moved with hi ...

says he has had the condition.

Notes

References

{{reflist, 30em, refs = {{cite journal , last1 = Angelillo , first1 = J. C. , last2 = Dolan , first2 = E. A. , date = January 1982 , title = The surgical correction of vertical maxillary excess (long face syndrome) , journal = Annals of Plastic Surgery , volume = 8 , issue = 1 , pages = 64–70 , language = en , issn = 0148-7043 , pmid = 7073194 , doi=10.1097/00000637-198201000-00010 , s2cid = 38905192 {{cite journal , url = http://www.ajodo.org/article/0002-9416(77)90176-2/abstract , last1 = Bell , first1 = William H. , last2 = Creekmore , first2 = Thomas D. , last3 = Alexander , first3 = R. G. , date = January 1977 , title = Surgical correction of the long face syndrome , journal = American Journal of Orthodontics , volume = 71 , issue = 1 , pages = 40–67 , language = en , issn = 0002-9416 , doi = 10.1016/0002-9416(77)90176-2 , pmid = 264364 {{cite journal , url = http://www.angle.org/doi/full/10.1043/0003-3219(2005)75 36:TOSOBW.0.CO;2 , last1 = Carano , first1 = Aldo , last2 = Siciliani , first2 = Giuseppe , last3 = Bowman , first3 = S. Jay , date = September 2005 , title = Treatment of skeletal open bite with a device for rapid molar intrusion: a preliminary report , journal = Angle Orthodontist , volume = 75 , number = 5 , pages = 736–746 , language = en , pmid = 16283813 {{cite book , url = https://books.google.com/books?id=E_3uCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA22 , last = Obwegeser , first = Hugo L. , author-link = Hugo Obwegeser , date = 2001 , title = Mandibular growth anomalies: terminology – aetiology – diagnosis – greatment , publisher =

Springer Springer or springers may refer to: Publishers * Springer Science+Business Media, aka Springer International Publishing, a worldwide publishing group founded in 1842 in Germany formerly known as Springer-Verlag. ** Springer Nature, a multinationa ...

, location = Berlin , isbn = 978-3-642-08655-7 , doi = 10.1007/978-3-662-04534-3 , url-status = live , archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20180210160956/https://books.google.com/books?id=E_3uCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA22 , archive-date = 2018-02-10 {{cite journal , last1 = Schendel , first1 = S. A. , last2 = Eisenfeld , first2 = J. , last3 = Bell , first3 = W. H. , last4 = Epker , first4 = B. N. , last5 = Mishelevich , first5 = D. J. , date = October 1976 , title = The long face syndrome: vertical maxillary excess , journal = American Journal of Orthodontics , volume = 70 , issue = 4 , pages = 398–408 , language = en , issn = 0002-9416 , pmid = 1067758 , doi=10.1016/0002-9416(76)90112-3 {{cite book , chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=eYeS-sLIv24C&pg=PA369 , last1 = Taub , first1 = Daniel I. , last2 = Jacobs , first2 = Jordan M. S. , last3 = Jacobs , first3 = Jonathan S. , date = 2013 , chapter = Chapter 16: Anthropometry, cephalometry, and orthognathic surgery , editor-last = Neligan , editor-first = Peter C. , title = Plastic surgery , others = Warren, Richard J., volume editor. , volume = 2: Aesthetic , edition = 3rd , publisher = Elsevier Saunders , location = New York , isbn = 978-1-4557-4049-9 , pages = 354–372 Congenital oral disorders Syndromes with craniofacial abnormalities

Definition and treatment

Notable people

See also

Notes

References