Assessment of donor area pain in patients with cleft lip and palate undergoing alveolar bone defects repairs using iliac crest autogenous grafting: a prospective randomized comparison of two bone extractors

ABSTRACT

Introduction

Autogenous bone grafting is the standard treatment for alveolar bone defects. However, morbidity in the donor area after the bone graft has been obtained continues to be a significant problem in cleft patients. This prospective randomized study compared donor area pain associated with the use of 2 bone extractors in patients with cleft lip and palate, who underwent treatment of alveolar bone defects using a bone graft obtained from the iliac crest.

Method

Thirty-six patients with cleft lip and palate underwent alveolar bone defect repair using a graft from the iliac crest, harvested with either a SOBRAPAR bone extractor (group A) or UCLA bone extractor (group B). Donor area pain was evaluated in the postoperative period with the aid of a unidimensional numerical pain scale (0, “no pain”; 10, “worst pain imaginable”).

Results

Comparison of the mean donor area pain score did not reveal any significant differences (p >0.05 for all comparisons) between the groups A and B, at any of the postoperative times evaluated. A significantly higher number of patients in group B reported no pain in the donor area, compared with group A (p <0.05).

Conclusions

This study showed that a significantly greater number of patients in group B reported “no pain”, compared with patients in group A; with regard to patients who reported any level of pain greater than zero, there were no between-group differences.

Keywords:
Donor area; Iliac crest; Pain; Alveolar bone graft; Bone extractors; Cleft lip and palate