What can I do if my baby has an unusual head shape?

If your baby is diagnosed with deformational plagiocephaly, brachycephaly or scaphocephaly and is between the ages of 3 and 18 months, your pediatrician or specialist may refer you to a practitioner who specializes in providing STAR cranial remolding orthoses. The STARband © is a plastic and foam device designed to gently correct your baby’s head.

Repositioning

The first thing you can do is talk to your pediatrician about your baby’s head. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests that pediatricians evaluate the baby’s head at each visit from the top, both sides, the front, and the back. The AAP also recommends that the physician talk to families about how to move the baby into a lot of different positions during the day, and stress the importance of “tummy time” whenever the baby is awake and supervised. “Tummy Time” is not only a good way to take pressure off the flattened areas, it also helps to build strong neck and trunk muscles, and will help your baby learn to roll, sit, and crawl when the time comes. If there is neck muscle imbalance or a delay in development, your pediatrician may refer your baby to a therapist for physical or occupational therapy. We provide repositioning tools in English and in Spanish. Repositioning is most effective before 6 months of age. If the infant is constantly positioning back to the flat area of the head, then repositioning will not be effective.

Is surgery required?

The pediatrician may also recommend that a pediatric neurosurgeon or plastic surgeon assess your baby’s head shape to ensure that the sutures are all open and to check for any other skull shape disorders. The specialist will examine your baby, and may order an X-ray, CT scan or MRI to rule out the possibility of craniosynostosis, which is a premature fusion of the sutures in the head and is much less common than deformational plagiocephaly. Craniosynostosis can cause head shape deformities similar to deformational plagiocephaly and deformational scaphocephaly, and may require surgery to remove the suture. After surgery, the physician may order a STAR cranial remolding orthosis for protection of the incision site or to acquire additional correction of the shape or proportion.

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