Investigación en labio y/o paladar hendido no sindrómico 1990-2014: Paradigmas abordados y vacíos por explorar

Objective: To investigate the type of research that has been carried out on non-syndromic cleft lip/palate (NSCL/P) between 1990 and 2014, where it has been produced and the advances, challenges and knowledge gaps to investigate potentially and contribute to understand and above all to prevent this malformation. Method: Critical narrative review of the published scientific literature of NSCL/P in Pubmed-Medline, Sciencie Direct, Ovid and Redalyc databases, classifying information by region, sub-themes and research paradigms. Results: Most research published on NSCL/P has been developed in Asia, Europe and North America respectively. The most investigated aspects are the genetic and molecular alterations associated with this malformation with 37.3% of the total investigations consulted, followed by clinical methods and techniques for the physical, functional and aesthetic rehabilitation of patients with fissures with a 32.4% and thirdly, the most studied aspects are individual risk factors and measures of disease frequency with 12%. From the total of studies consulted, 64.45% were posed from the positivist paradigm, 33, 9% from the pragmatic paradigm and 1.66% from the rationalist paradigm, no article was found from the critical paradigm. Discussion and conclusions: The majority of NSCL/P research, is posed from positivism, presenting a fragmented view of reality and reducing the understanding of this entity to purely biological aspects and individual risk factors, making invisible the social processes in the territories, that can produce and reproduce this malformation.