Long-term Nasal Mucosal Tissue Expansion Use

After reading the interesting Clinical Note on long-term nasal mucosal tissue expansion by Romo et al, 1 I would like to expand the knowledge of the authors and the reviewers. When Romo et al, in the final paragraph of their article, state, "These studies are the first description of expanded mucosal surfaces to our knowledge," they are mistaken. Actually, on the other side of their region of interest—the nasal floor—in the mouth, mucosal tissue expansion has been performed and reported since 1986. 2-9 Initially, intraoral subperiosteal tissue expansion was used for alveolar ridge augmentation purposes. 2-4 Later on, palatal soft-tissue expansion was applied for facilitating the closure of oronasal fistulas in cleft lip and palate surgery. 5,7 Longitudinal animal experiments on mucoperiosteal expansion have already been performed and were and casu quo are to be published. 6,8-10 The results indicate that mucoperiosteal expansion is as feasible as skin expansion