Morphological Analysis of Soft Palate Using MRI in Healthy Individual

Velopharyngeal port is a vital structure in human body for carrying out important functions such as speech, swallowing, etc. Velopharyngeal incompetence arises due to ineffective or incomplete seal between oral and nasal cavity. The study of soft palate patterns like shape, length, and width offers an evidence to evaluate any risk factors for velopharyngeal insufficiency. This study was conducted to assess various palatal shapes and lengths using Magnetic resonance (MR) images and to establish their association with age and gender. A retrospective pilot study with 60 Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images belonging to 30 males and 30 females were assessed for soft palate shape, soft palate length, and vertical length. The data was entered in Microsoft Office Excel Sheet and was subjected to statistical analysis using SPSS version 26.0. Descriptive statistics like frequencies and percentages for categorical data, mean, and standard deviation (SD) for numerical data, comparison of frequencies of categories was done using chi-square test. ‘Butt’ variant was the most commonly encountered type, followed by the ‘Rat-tail’ variant as the second common type in our sample. A statistically non-significant difference was seen for the frequencies between the groups (p> 0.05). The range of soft palate length (SPL) varied from 1.2 cm to 4.3 cm (S.D-0.674). The soft palate vertical length (SPVL) range is from 1.2 cm to 4.3 cm (S.D.-0.687). No statistically significant association of SPVL with the type of soft palate was seen (p> 0.05). However, soft palate length (SPL) increases significantly with age. The study showed soft palate length increases significantly with age.  Hence older individuals can be screened for soft palate related abnormalities for evaluation of sleep related disorder. Further such studies with more sample size are required to establish a correlation between the shape and length of the soft palate. This can aid as a diagnostic clue in the early diagnosis of soft palatal abnormalities during the patient examination.