Postpalatoplasty oral rehabilitation

Abstract

Palatal fistula is a major complication following cleft palate repair and in combination with premature primary teeth loss, compromises a child's mastication, nutrition, speech, and aesthetics. Other major symptoms comprise hyper nasality of voice and nasal regurgitation. Therefore, rehabilitation of the palatal defect and the partially edentulous space needs to be performed until the surgical repair of the palatal fistula is achieved. This case report describes the oral prosthetic rehabilitation of a 4-year-old patient with a palatal fistula and prematurely lost primary incisors utilizing a removable partial denture obturator.

Keywords

• cleft palate
• denture
• fistula
• speech