My brother had a premature son born with an asymmetrical head (similar to your son) and looked into the cranial bands. He then asked himself the question - how many males (from school age to old males) have funny shaped, asymetrical or flat heads today. If you think about it there are millions of bald men from their early 20s these days and millions more inc children who shave their heads for fashion reasons so it would be a very obvious problem. This made him realise that the problem with his son would rectify itself naturally - which it did by the time he was 3 years old. You have to ask yourself the question - would your son's head have corrected itself naturally? did the band do nothing more than very expensive snake oil and make him look like a Power Ranger for a while. Millions of bald men can't be wrong. Glad your boy is looking so well but I'm also glad NICE is spending NHS money on necessary and proveable treatments.
I appreciate where you are coming from and I agree in most cases it does resolve itself. My blog is more about the severe cases where it has been proven that it does not.
In NICE's response to me they made a point to state that "A lack of guidance from NICE is NOT the same as a recommendation against the use of a treatment. There are many treatments available on the NHS which NICE has not appraised". Furthermore there are NHS trusts which do provide treatment and I have published this response from NHS Bristol "North BristolNHS Trust believe sufficient evidence exists to support the technique in reducing the risk of long term cranial deformity and avoiding a few of them having big craniofacial remodelling operations".
We where given the recommendation to use a helmet to treat my son from the Craniofacial Consultant at Chelsea Westminster Hospital. Even with this recommendation our local NHS refused to provide funding. We fell victim to the NHS Postcode lottery. However, we are fortunate to be members of Beneden Healthcare society and applied to them for help in my son's case. Their panel of doctors and nurses assesed the evidence and recommendations in my son's case and offered to fund his treatment.
There is a yahoo support group called Olderplag where parents of older children who where not treated and even some adults go to discuss their options. I might add that my brother in law is a Barber in London and since Evrens case he has commented to us about older people coming in with obvious Plagiocephaly. I am truly glad that your nephew saw improvements without any treatment. However there are people out there who have not and given the severity of my sons case I was not willing to take the risk. I would rather know now that I did all I could do than regret doing nothing later.
My brother had a premature son born with an asymmetrical head (similar to your son) and looked into the cranial bands. He then asked himself the question - how many males (from school age to old males) have funny shaped, asymetrical or flat heads today. If you think about it there are millions of bald men from their early 20s these days and millions more inc children who shave their heads for fashion reasons so it would be a very obvious problem. This made him realise that the problem with his son would rectify itself naturally - which it did by the time he was 3 years old. You have to ask yourself the question - would your son's head have corrected itself naturally? did the band do nothing more than very expensive snake oil and make him look like a Power Ranger for a while. Millions of bald men can't be wrong. Glad your boy is looking so well but I'm also glad NICE is spending NHS money on necessary and proveable treatments.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate where you are coming from and I agree in most cases it does resolve itself. My blog is more about the severe cases where it has been proven that it does not.
DeleteIn NICE's response to me they made a point to state that "A lack of guidance from NICE is NOT the same as a recommendation against the use of a treatment. There are many treatments available on the NHS which NICE has not appraised". Furthermore there are NHS trusts which do provide treatment and I have published this response from NHS Bristol "North BristolNHS Trust believe sufficient evidence exists to support the technique in reducing the risk of long term cranial
deformity and avoiding a few of them having big craniofacial remodelling operations".
We where given the recommendation to use a helmet to treat my son from the Craniofacial Consultant at Chelsea Westminster Hospital. Even with this recommendation our local NHS refused to provide funding. We fell victim to the NHS Postcode lottery. However, we are fortunate to be members of Beneden Healthcare society and applied to them for help in my son's case. Their panel of doctors and nurses assesed the evidence and recommendations in my son's case and offered to fund his treatment.
There is a yahoo support group called Olderplag where parents of older children who where not treated and even some adults go to discuss their options. I might add that my brother in law is a Barber in London and since Evrens case he has commented to us about older people coming in with obvious Plagiocephaly. I am truly glad that your nephew saw improvements without any treatment. However there are people out there who have not and given the severity of my sons case I was not willing to take the risk. I would rather know now that I did all I could do than regret doing nothing later.