Introduction: Significant disturbances of the development of the jaws and discrepancies in the alignment of the craniofacial skeleton frequently will develop as result of palatine and labial cleft or other factors that would require orthodontic treatment associated or not with orthognathic surgery. The present study analyses and compares the predominant facial standard in patients with clef lip/palate and patients with dentofacial discrepancies not associated with clefts candidate to orthognathic surgery.

Patients and methods: A sample of sixty patients attending at the Hospital Geral Universitário of the Faculdade de Odontologia da Universidade de Cuiabá – UNIC were divided equally in 30 patients with dentofacial discrepancies candidates to orthognathic surgery and 30 patients with clef lip/palate in an age group of 15 years-old were submitted to the facial analysis. The results between the two groups were compared in order to verify the standards of predominant facial development in each one of the groups.

Results: Patients with dentofacial discrepancies not associated to cleft lip/palate present altered symmetrical facial growth while the cleft group presented commonly asymmetrical growth, with greater differences amongst the middle and lower thirds of the face. The results indicated distinct standards of growth between the groups, in special associated to the upper lip, nose and jaws.

Conclusion: Since the craniofacial growth present a distinct patterns when a cleft lip/palate is present, patients with cleft lip/palate would require changes in the conventional protocol of facial evaluation in order to predict better results.

Conflict of interest: None declared.