Since 1967 twelve children with muscular torticollis were treated at the
Los Angeles Shriners Hospital for Crippled Children with a modified bipolar
release of the sternocleidomastoid muscle. The results of the procedure
were compared with the results in twenty-two other patients who had had
either conservative treatment or other types of operations and who were
seen between 1952 and 1981. The average follow-up was nine years (range,
one to thirty-three years). Fourteen patients, most of them less than one
year old, were treated non-operatively and had 86 per cent good or
excellent results. The bipolar release and z-plasty was performed either
when conservative treatment had failed or in older children who had had
other operations, and it yielded 92 per cent good or excellent results.
Only 15 per cent good and 77 per cent fair results were obtained when
surgical procedures other than bipolar release were performed.