In Adriana Da Silveira’s day to day job, the need to better define cosmetic outcomes for patients is great.
Children born with facial deformities such as cleft palate or hemifacial microsomia – a condition characterized by asymmetrical face and skull – pass through her office at Dell Children’s Medical Center, where she is chief of orthodontics at the Craniofacial & Reconstructive Plastic Surgery Center. Because the deformities of her patients have existed since birth, Da Silveira, Dr. Patrick Kelley and other plastic surgeons struggle to explain to parents what their child will look like following a surgical procedure. After all, there is no frame of reference for what the child would have looked like had the deformity never occurred.
Adriana Da Silveira, chief of orthodontics at Dell Children’s Medical Center
“Basically, it’s like we’re having to guess,” Da Silveira said. “Parents want to know what their child is going to look like in the end but when they can’t see it and there’s no visual way to show it, they just have to trust us. And for a kid it’s hard to say what the normal or acceptable appearance of a face is.”
Mia Markey and UT Engineering students are applying the same 3D imaging technology used at MD Anderson to eventually help Da Silveira and other surgeons.
Researchers are in the process of collecting 3D images and measurements of Hispanic children ages 7-12 who do not have facial deformities. The group represents the largest child population treated at the center and images of them could help researchers determine what facial characteristics are considered normal or aesthetically-pleasing on the face of a Hispanic child in that age group.
After a total of 80 images are collected, the attractiveness of the photos will be rated. Researchers plan to develop statistical correlations from these ratings and provide doctors with guides or computer simulations of which facial characteristics are considered most attractive – be it when a nose is shaped smaller or the width of a smile is larger.
Mia Markey, professor in the Cockrell School of Engineering’s Department of Biomedical Engineering
In a sense, such advances will help put a face to Central Texas children. Along the way, they are providing Markey’s students with hands-on research opportunities that they otherwise would not receive.
“If you go into a hospital and volunteer, you’re not going to get this same level of interaction as I get here,” said Brian Ku, who will be a senior in biomedical engineering this fall and is helping lead the task of collecting images.
Ku is among a group of students – from undergraduate through postdoctoral and representing a range of engineering disciplines – who contribute to the research. The students have had the chance to watch surgeries and interact with patients undergoing reconstructive surgery – experiences that Markey says are crucial to their education.
“As I was developing my research career and thinking of the direction I could go, it was important for me to do something where people didn’t say, ‘Why?’ I wanted people to recognize its importance,” Markey said. “And with this, we can see where the research is going to help someone. So while it’s exciting to discover something new in our work, it’s equally exciting to know we can impact a person’s life for the better.”