Seeking Advice on Cranial Helmet for 9 Month Old

The same thing happened to on of my twin boys, I think its caused from being smashed against the pelvis because he was head down in position to come out for 2 months while the other one just layed over the top of him head up, and he has the roundest head lol anyways my son never wore a helmit and his head is fine. they grow into them.

Hi J.: My 3rd daughter had a very crooked head when she was a newborn and I discussed the issue with my pediatrician when she was maybe around 5-6 months. He mentioned the many trips to Children's Hospital that a helmet would require. I really felt then that it was not worth it. I made sure to alternate how I put her down in her crib to "even out" the crookedness. I did the same thing with my 4th baby who had a flat head from being a back sleeper. My third and fourth children are now 7 and 5 and have normal-looking heads. If you felt my 7 year old's head, though, it still feels rather crooked. No one can notice and she's a very bright, healthy girl. I also have a very "truthful" medical family who would tell me if she looked "crooked" but she doesn't. God bless your decision.

Hi J.,

My daughter had a rough delivery and ended up needed a cranial cap. She had a severe case of Plagiocephaly. We were able to get her into her first cap around 4 months. She ended up needing a second cap when she grew out of the first. They can be pricy if not covered by insurance, which is almost irrelivent. We were fortunate enough to find a great place, www.cranialtech.com . They will give you an honest evaluation. They might say that the bones are set and there will be limited or no change in the head shape. This is why we didn't go on to get a third cap. My daughter is still disproportionate and when the baby fat goes it could be more noticable. I would say get a second opinion, and remember You and your husband are the final say in the care of you and your family. Good luck. There are really no cons to the cap other than it gets a little sweaty and she may not want to wear hats after having to wear a helmet.

Hi J.
I too have twins-they are 7 now and have a 1 yr old little girl. My twins had to wear helmets starting at about 5/6mos till a little over a year; one had to wear it a little longer than the other. They proved to be quite effective, but it does take getting use to- the baby & the parent. There is a Great Cranialfacial clinic in Loma Linda. We live in Corona & were referred there & had a positive experience. 9 mos. is a little older than what they typically start the babies, but I think if you act aggressively on this now, and they want to use a helmet for correction- you should still see a difference in a few mos.??? Act now & Call today though(sorry to sound like a commercial there).

My little nephew had the same deal happening. I think he had his helmet at 6 months - great results. If you and your hubby can see it now, and if it bothers you, you may as well take care of it now if you can. My nephew is now 4, and his head is as round as ever! Looks great! Good luck!
LL

Cranial sacral work and possibly pediatric chiropractic. I can work wonders and fast!

Pls check into Cranial Sacral work first. You may never need any helmet. www.upledgerinstitute.com will give you great info and you can get a list of certified practitioners in your area. You may be very surprised at what all CS treatment can do! Best wishes! J.

My daughter, who is now 13 months, wore a cranial helmet (DOC Band from Cranial Technologies). Her case was also minor, and we did it because we worried we would regret it if we didn't do it. Like your child, she had flatness on the back right side and a small bulge on the forehead on the same side. The right eye also looked slightly bigger. Like you, I don't think anyone else noticed these things much. She was 8 months or so when she got the helmet and wore it for a few months before she outgrew it. Did it help? I honestly don't know. We had been monitoring the situation carefully for months and it had improved quite a bit on its own. She does still have a very slight eye size discrepancy that I don't think anyone else notices -- just us because we're so incredibly attuned to it. The forehead seems pretty level at this point, the back of the head rounded out quite a bit, not perfect, but once she has hair no one will be the wiser.

I have talked to other parents out and about town who raved about the results they saw, but I think that their kids had more severe cases. Unfortunately, it's now or never on these things, and I understand your conundrum. Even though I question its effectiveness, I guess if I had it to do over again, I would, because if we hadn't I would always wonder, "What if?" I kept imagining my teenage daughter yelling at me because we didn't do anything about it when we could...parental guilt is a powerful thing!

Hope this helps, please let me know if you have other questions I can help with.
E.

I would just for the fact the she is your little girl. Boys can be so mean when the get older. I have a little girl 8 months and she has a lazy left lid. We took her to the Dr and he said that is was not causing any damage to her eye and she could see, so that if we wanted to do surgery that is would be cosmetic also. They only thing with that is we can't do it until she is about to start school. I saw do it. Life is hard enough. Don't give people something to make fun of her for.

Hope this helps

We went to Cranial Technoligies..i know i spelled that wrong but I'm TIRED!!...
My husband and I debated it for 6 months and it was a GREAT decision. Do you want your baby to wear a helmet now or be goofed on by the other teenagers in middle school! We just moved here from Memphis and I posed the same question on the site to the Moms there. I got 97 responses...ALL of them positive! That did it for me. Our son has had his 'hat' for 2 months and the difference is unbelievable! He is never bothered by it and since he is walking now when he bonks his little head it doesn't hurt! We may keep it until he's 20! Good luck!

I'm sure all cases are individual...but my son (now 5) was recomended a helmet as well (I think when he was about 6 months old)...we went to a specialist also, the results were just slightly off the normal scales...he said to come back in two months to see if anything had changed..and it had...his head was rounding out naturally, we had one more visit and his head was almost perfectly normal...no helmet was needed for us...

Hi, J..

My daughter (now 6) was 10 months old when I brought her home from China. She had a flat spot on her head. The doctor said it was really too late to use the helmet, and that it was only a cosmetic issue, covered nicely by the right haircut. :O> Her flat area is not very noticeable at all. Good luck. - J.

Dear J.:

No one is going to admit it's noticable...they're usually being polite. ("Do I look fat in this?" "No, you look lovely!"...you know the routine.) Try not to worry about them, just focus on your baby and her needs. I think that if you can notice it, your child certainly will when she's older.

Just think, it'll be a bit of a hassle at first, then you'll get used to it, then it'll be over. It's just like when we get our kids palatal expanders, braces, contacts, electric shavers...none of these things are mandatory but they're wonderful for improving areas of need. We could ignore them or we could give our kids the best. I think you'll be pleased if you do it.

Best wishes,

M.
PS: I have a friend who ignored this same issue in her child and while we all notice, why would we tell her something now that it's too late? I love the child and it bums me out that it wasn't taken care of...that's why I answered your post.

We decided on cranial sacral/chiropratic option instead of the helmet when my son was 4 months old. We went to Dr. John Graham at Cedars and he gave me the option to choose. My son's flat spot wasn't very noticeable. I don't know if he just grew into to it or if the cranial sacral method worked but he has a beautiful shaped head now. The acupuncturist i used is located in Burbank and if you are interested, i will look for her number. Good luck!

My son started a helmet at 9 months and will wear it for another month until he's a year. It has worked wonders on the shape of his head. It's not too late to fix the problem, they are still growing a lot at 9 months. Ours was purely cosmetic also and it was our decision whether to pursue the helmet. we are SO glad we did. I have had so many people come up to us and say they wish their parents had fixed their odd shaped heads. It's something we felt we had to do for him to make him as normal as possible (kids are so mean to each other and tease each other for the smallest differences) I don't think we will ever regret our decision. And the best part is his head looks amazing already. We go to Cranial Technologies in Pasadena.

That said, it's harder on you than on them. My son hasn't slept well since he got the helmet and it's hot and uncomfortable. However, it's short term and my husband and I were willing to deal with the short term difficulties in order to have our son have the long term results of a normal shaped head.

Good luck with your decision. Try to remember you won't regret the decision to put the helmet on but you may regret not putting it on. Email me directly if you have any more questions.

Our daughter wore a helmet from 8 months to 10 months. We were lucky to catch a growth spurt. We were told to do it before 14 months - after that, they don't see much improvement. As for the cosmetic issue - think about being 14 years old. Or 16. Or 32. And looking in the mirror and seeing all the flaws, real or imagined, and how awful that is. Now think if you knew your parents could have corrected one of them but didn't. Ours was a little more than cosmetic, but we are so glad that we used the helmet. Our daughter's head is now perfectly round! The only drawback - it didn't smell good while it was on. But the results are well worth it.

Hi J.,

Our son's head a very odd shaped, it happened during a very difficult birth. I was afraid that his head would be like that forever so I asked our doctor if he thougt a helmet could to reshape it, our doctor was an old fashion said if anything it's just going to bother him to wear it a his head would make it's way back to shape, it did and I'm glad we didn't do it.

What a pain it would have been, there are so many things that can happen during a childs lifetime - like when our son was 4 he needed both his eyes opporated on, thank goodness we didn't impose a helmet when it was optional.

Marina

My daughter (now 20 months old) had the same exact problem. She wore the helmet for three months and now her head is just about perfect. She started wearing the helmet at 6 months but you should be fine starting at 9 months - she just may need to wear it a little longer.

My daughter had absolutely no problem with the helmet - she could do everything in it and seemed completely comfortable. We had it painted as well and thought she looked really cute in it.

If you haven't already - check out Cranial Technologies in Pasadena. Their website is cranialtech.com.

Good luck and get her fitted right away!

Hi,
You didn't mention what specialist you went to but if it wasn't Cranial Technologies, I recommend paying them a visit - no matter how far you have to travel to do so. I took my son to them and they took measurements and gave me a recommendation. The measurements were just within the range they consider acceptable and we decided not to treat because we live very far away from any Cranial Tech locations. If we had lived closer, I might have treated him. The measurement from the right front to left back of his head was 4mm shorter than the measurement from the left front to the right back of his head. It was nice to have things quantified rather than just going by how things looked. He's now 2 and the assymetry is still there but I'm the only one who notices it. I don't expect anyone else, except perhaps his wife who may stare at him almost as much as I do lol, will notice it.

There are also 2 other places to get support: iVillage has a Cranio-facial abnormality message board & Yahoo has a Plagiocephaly group.

Act fast because your window of opportunity is closing fast but at 9 months it is still open for some improvement.

Good luck!!

Hi,

A friend of mine- her daughter had to wear a cranial helmet. It worked wonders for her and I know that she was so glad that she did it. So, from what I have heard- they work great- I guess you would want to do it now- so that there are no issues later.

Good Luck!

Hi there,

I just wanted to offer you an alternative idea. I just actually spoke with a doctor at this Osteopathic center in San Diego and she mentioned that they do cranial work. She said that they have completely corrected many different misshapen heads for young children. You may want to call and see if they could help. The number in San Diego is ###-###-####.

I used a cranial helmet on my son, beginning at 6.5 months - 11 months. I definitely noticed an improvement, and was glad I did it. He had ZERO adjustment time to the helmet, so that made it easier. As far as going out into public, occasionally I removed it, but made certain it was on most of the day, and always at night.

He's 14 months now, and I actually wish I had kept in on for another month.

My son started his DOC Band at 10 months old and it made such a difference. Our dr said to reposition him, but he'd always find a way to roll back and lay on the right side of his head. I felt bad for not starting it earlier, but luckily he grew a lot during this time and you can't really tell it's still a little flat. Part of our decision was that, as a blond boy, if his hair is short, you can tell that it's crooked and if he looses his hair when he's older, he'll have to live like that the rest of his life.

He went through 2 bands in 6 months, starting in the summer. He didn't really mind it. I'm glad that we did it. Our insurance, Aetna, fully covered the 1st band and partially covered the 2nd which was a great help. Good luck!

Hi! Like Piper responded... we too went to Cranial technologies for our son's flatening of the head in back which caused widening at the top of the head at 5 months old. His one ear was slightly lower as a result. He was in the helmet for a little over 8 weeks and WOW... what a difference. I can send before and after pics to anyone who is interested) We figured that if we had it in our power to make a difference, even slightly to improve his appearance, then it was the least we could do for him since he would have to live w/ his head for the rest of his life!

Your other option is repositioning which can help but I am not sure to what extent, due to your child's age,it will make a difference. Your child's skull is still grwoing so the helmet is configured such that it would apply pressure and stunt additional growth where the head is is already protruding and allow for growth in the other areas needed to even out the appearance.

If you worry about the child's comfort and if it would be bothersome I say it bothers us more that it does them.... they adapt to the helmet after a few days of contiual wear.

If you worry about what other people will say - we countered comments by painting the helmet like the LTs Chargers helmet so instead of him looking like something was 'wrong' he looked really cool and people commented positively.

I know that you will make the choice that is right for your baby. Please feel free to contact me if you need more information!

hey J.,
Sounds like the helmet wouldn't be covered and I was told that they run pretty high.
When we went thru that we were approved for Physical Therapy, so my little man went to Physical Therapy several times a week for a few months, gradually working down to once a week, then once every other week, and once a month, and so on.
He "graduated" and doesn't go anymore, but we had a lot of success with it and chose that option since we were too late for a helmet...........sounds similar to where you are.
PT was only a ten dollar copay each visit, so it was way less than a helmet and we did see marked improvement.
Hope that helps!
:)
S.
www.MomsOnAMission.US

J.,
My son got his first helmet when he was 7 months old. The maker of that helmet did not do a good job and it hurt him. When we went back to his Dr. for a check he had the insurance company pay for a new helmet that was manufactured at the place he worked. That helmet has worked perfectly for my son. He did not get it until he was almost nine months. He just turned a year and we are seeing dramatic improvements on it. He is now fine medically but they are working on the cosmetics. I would definately recommend doing it. It has helped him so much. You may even want to get a second opinion. Good luck!!

Looks like you've gotten some sound advice already but I'd also like to say that my daughter wore a helmet for about 7 weeks (between 4-6 mo)...it was no big deal, and we made her helmet our little art project! It can really be a fun accessory! People are going to look at it, anyway, so it might as well be amusing. We are so glad we did it. She did not have a severe case of plagiocephaly, but the threat of causing visual disturbances and/or jaw misalignment, however small, was enough to get that helmet on her head. Seven weeks of appointments and sweaty heads vs. a lifetime of inconveniences, pain and insecurity? Do it, girl.