David Dries was a new father whose young son, Zander appeared to be perfectly healthy. But a routine doctor's office visit turned up a medical issue.
"We went to the pediatrician for a standard checkup, and he noticed a little flat spot in the back my son's head," said Dries. He told us we might want to go get It checked out. "It's something they call plagiocephaly."
Dries talked about the issue, which is commonly called baby flat head syndrome.
"You're familiar with something called SIDS, which is Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. That became a problem, and you need to have babies sleep on their back in order to reduce the incidence of it," said the father. "Now, we all put our babies on their back, that's how they sleep. They're on the back, on their head a lot. That's what happened to my son. You get a flat spot, because they're laying in that spot (that position) so much."
The family was referred to a company called Cranial Technolgies, which specializes in treatment of the issue.
"You every see babies with helmets? Those cool looking bands around their head? It's open on the top," said Dries. "That help form the head shape. The babies heads are soft, and they're growing at a rapid rate, so if you give little pressure points on the side, it helps get rid of the flat spot in the back."
Emma DiMarco is a clinician with Cranial Technologies.
"Plagiocephaly is a condition that comes from the head shape malforming when we sleep babies on their backs," said DiMarco. "It is the safe way to sleep the baby, and it reduces the rsik of SIDS. But, as I explain to parents, the growth is lazy, and will sometimes go in a direction we don't want it to."
The special helmets are key to treatment of baby flathead syndrome.
"We do a 3-D image of their head, and we assess to what degree if any if there is a malformation," said DiMarco. "A lot of kids have perfectly fine heads don't need treatment. Once we've imaged them, and made our recommendations, we run insurance, and get them covered. From there, they come back, we manufacture the DOC band in a week, and they wear it 23 hours a day. They come back to see us, and as they grow we remove material to accomodate that growth, and keep telling it (the growth) where we want it to go."
DiMarco says the helmets are only needed for a relatively short period of time to have an impact. She said because it's based on growth, the youngest babies may be wearing the bands for one and a half to two months, and the older babies three to four months.
She emphasized that the syndrome isn’t harmful to kids, even if it isn’t corrected.
"There is no negative impact to the health of the brain," said DiMarco. But, she said it could affect other functional things, like the fit of a helmet or glasses later in life.
Cranial Technologies operates a number of clinics in Southern California, but it’s now taking the technology on the road with its first ever state-of-the-art mobile clinic. It will bring diagnosis and treatment to Simi Valley, Oxnard, and Thousand Oaks.
"Everyone has experienced LA traffic. We have 12 brick and mortar clinics in the LA area, but that's still an hour plus ride from Ventura County," said Scott Cable, who is Cranial Technologies Chief Operating Officer. "When we had the vision of doing this, looking where we would launch our first mobile clinic, we thought nowhere better than here."
Dries said his son, Zander finished his treatment for the syndrome more than two years ago. "He's doing great. Round head, a crazy head of hair, he's doing incredible," said the father.
