Prevalence of Simonart’s band in cleft children at a cleft center in Indonesia: A nine-year retrospective study

Background. Simonart’s band is a soft tissue band that connects the cleft gap of the base of the nostril or the margin of the alveolus. While research on the prevalence of Simonart’s band in cleft lip and palate cases has been carried out in various countries, research on Simonart’s band in Indonesia has yet to be conducted. Objectives. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of different types of Simonart’s band at a cleft center in Indonesia. Material and methods. The data of cleft patients were reviewed retrospectively over a 9-year period at the Cleft Lip and Palate Center Center, Harapan Kita Women and Children Hospital, Jakarta, Indonesia. The patients were divided based on the type of cleft and the type of Simonart’s band. The results were analyzed by means of descriptive statistics. Results. Out of 638 cleft patients from the period 2008–2016, 77 patients had Simonart’s band. The lip-to-lip band was most commonly found (52 cases, 67.5%). The lip-to-alveolus band was found in 20 cases (26.0%) and the alveolus-to-alveolus band had the lowest prevalence of 5 cases (6.5%). Associations between the cleft type (unilateral cleft lip and palate (UCLP), unilateral cleft lip and alveolus (UCLA), and bilateral cleft lip and palate (BCLP)) and Simonart’s band type were all significant (p = 0.001, according to Fisher’s exact test), which indicates significant differences in the distribution of the bands with regard to different cleft types. There was a significant difference in the distribution of the bands between the UCLP and UCLA groups (p = 0.000). On the other hand, the distribution of the bands in the UCLP group did not differ much from that in the BCLP group (p = 0.065). Conclusions. The prevalence of Simonart’s band was significantly higher in the patients with the unilateral complete cleft of the primary and secondary palate than in the subjects with the cleft of the primary palate. In the UCLP group, most patients had the lip-to-lip band type. In the BCLP group, the majority also had the lip-to-lip band type. In contrast, in the UCLA group, the majority showed the lip-to-alveolus band type.