Prevention of auricular deformity in children with diastrophic dysplasia

Abstract

In diastrophic dysplasia, auricular swelling commonly occurs in early infancy, inevitably leading to deformity. Till date, no description exists in the literature for the initial treatment of auricular swelling in this population. We present two siblings with diastrophic dysplasia on whom auricular swelling was treated with incision and drainage or conforming auricular molds. The ear treated with incision and drainage had worse outcome than those treated with pressure alone. This paper presents a novel but simple approach to the compression of auricular swelling in the setting of diastrophic dysplasia, using conforming molds with the goal of preventing permanent deformity.