Cleft Lip vs. Facial Cleft

Left picture: The diagnosis is a broad cleft lip alveolus of the left side. Right picture: Here, the diagnosis is a severe form of a median facial cleft with extra- and intracranial defects of the midline structures.

At first sight, a cleft of the midline seems to be present in both patients. Left picture: In this pathology the left upper lip does not come up to the columella, and the left nasal wing is collapsed and shifted to the lateral side. Right picture: Two identical nasal wings are recognizable in this pathology. The equally shaped nasal wings are shifted in a lateral and upward direction, and the cleft lies exactly in the midline and is not as wide as the cleft in the contralateral picture. There is also a striking disproportion between the face and the neurocranium, similar to a microencephaly. On pulling away the halves of the upper lip in the picture at the bottom a defect of the columella and of the nasal septum is visible with a missing medial wall and bottom of the nasal cavity which communicates with the vestibulum.