ORPHA:141037
Fourth branchial cleft anomaly
Also known as: Fourth branchial cleft cyst · Fourth branchial cleft fistula
Publications
74
47.8th percentile
Trials
0
Interventional, condition-specific
Researchers
296
Distinct authors in sample
Gene link
—
Readiness
1/6
Stages with a signal
Clinical definition (Orphanet)
A rare otorhinolaryngeal characterized by a soft, fluctuant mass, abscess or draining tract along the anterior border of the lower half of sternocleidomastoid muscle, occasionally leading to development of retropharyngeal abscess, acute suppurative thyroiditis, stridor, respiratory distress, odynophagia, and dysphagia. Anomaly occurs as a tract from the piriform sinus to the thyroid gland. A fourth branchial cleft fistula passes deep to the superior laryngeal nerve but superficial to the recurrent laryngeal nerve, which is the main difference in comparison to the third branchial cleft fistula.
Cross-references
Joined from Mondo / Orphanet. MeSH labels may enter searches; UMLS / OMIM / NCIT are stored for reference.
- MONDO:0015378
- UMLS:C3873490
Additional Mondo synonyms (2)
fourth branchial cleft cyst · fourth branchial cleft fistula
Research stages
Trial readiness signals
Where this condition sits on an open-data research pipeline — not how close a treatment is, and not medical advice. Empty stages often mean “not in these databases under this Mondo ID,” not “impossible.”
1/6 stages with a signal
Research-stage checklist from open sources (GenCC, literature, Monarch when enriched, ClinicalTrials.gov). Not a prognosis or care recommendation.
- Gene identifiedNot found
No GenCC disease–gene assertion in this build
- LiteraturePresent
74 matched papers (51 in last 10 years) Source
- Phenotype characterisedNot found
No HPO disease–phenotype associations via Monarch for these Mondo IDs
- Animal modelNot found
No Alliance genotype “model of” associations via Monarch for these Mondo IDs
- Orphan designationNot found
No FDA or EMA orphan-drug designation matched this disease via UMLS or preferred name Source
- Interventional trialNot found
No matched interventional trial under our ClinicalTrials.gov rules
Biology
Genes and phenotypes
Gene–disease validity from GenCC, plus phenotypes and animal models joined from Monarch Initiative via Mondo ID — not a clinical diagnosis aid.
Do we know what causes it?
Not yet — the cause hasn't been pinned down in GenCC.
No strong gene–disease assertion joined for this Orphanet entity.
Phenotypes (Monarch / HPO)
None returned for this Mondo ID. That often means “not linked under this ID,” not “no clinical features.”
Animal models (Monarch / Alliance)
None returned for this Mondo ID. Empty here is not proof that no model organism work exists under another name or gene.
Monarch fetch 2026-07-29
Therapies
Designations, candidates, and chemicals
FDA OOPD and EMA orphan designations, Open Targets clinical candidates, and CTD chemical associations via MyDisease.info. These never change the interventional-trial headline.
Orphan designation (FDA · EMA)
No designation matched this disease via UMLS or preferred name on the FDA OOPD mirror or EMA orphan register. Absence here is not proof that none exists under another wording.
Open Targets candidates
No drugs or clinical candidates returned for this Mondo ID on Open Targets.
CTD chemicals (MyDisease.info)
No CTD chemical associations returned for this Mondo ID.
Literature
Is anyone studying this?
74
74 papers have ever been published on this condition (under this name). For scale, breast cancer has over 700,000. Median papers in the last 10 years for a rare disease in this dataset (publications denominator n=3967) is 59.
74 papers since the earliest indexed year in this search — median last-10-year count for a rare disease in this dataset is 59 (publications denominator n=3967).
51 in the last 10 years · high confidence · 47.8th percentile (publications denominator)
Phrase hits: 74 · MeSH hits: 0
Who's working on it?
296
Distinct author names in 74 sampled papers — named people below.
Who's working on it?
No interventional trial matched this name; these authors publish on it in the sampled literature — a practical starting point for contact.
- 01Chen J2 papers · 2024
Department of General Surgery, Shanghai Children's Hospital, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.
Papers in Europe PMC - 02Han Z2 papers · 2025
Department of Radiology, Beijing Children's Hospital, Capital Medical University, National Center for Children's Health, No.56, Nanlishilu Road, Xicheng District, Beijing, 100045, PR China.
Papers in Europe PMC - 03Lee EJ2 papers · 2019
Research Institute of Clinical Medicine of Chonbuk National University, Biomedical Research Institute of Chonbuk National University Hospital, Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, Jeonju, Republic of Korea. Electronic address: imaima97@naver.com.
Papers in Europe PMC - 04Li Y2 papers · 2022
From the Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging (Y.L., C.E.L., V.A.F., O.A.G.), Neuroradiology Section, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California yi.li@ucsf.edu.
Papers in Europe PMC - 05Park JE2 papers · 2026
Department of Radiology, Ajou University Hospital, School of Medicine, Ajou University, Suwon, Korea.
Papers in Europe PMC - 06Wang Y2 papers · 2016
Department of Otorhinolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery,the First Affiliated Hospital Kunming Medical University,Kunming,650032,China.
Papers in Europe PMC - 07Abdul Rahim F1 paper · 2025
Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Hospital Sultanah Bahiyah, Kedah, Malaysia.
Papers in Europe PMC - 08
- 09
- 10Adams A1 paper · 2016
Department of Radiology, Royal London Hospital, Barts Health NHS Trust, London, UK. ashokadams@hotmail.com.
Papers in Europe PMC
Clinical research
Is a treatment being tested?
0
interventional trials for this specific condition
No interventional trial testing a treatment matched this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov (observational studies and pan-disease registries are listed separately when present).
Data as of 11 September 2026 · last trial check 11 September 2026
No matched interventional trials. This is true for 77.2% of diseases in the trials denominator (5501 of 7126). Here are the researchers publishing on it.
high confidence · 38.6th percentile (trials denominator)
Recruiting interventional trials
From the matched ClinicalTrials.gov set
No interventional trial testing a treatment was found for this specific condition name on ClinicalTrials.gov.
See who's working on it — people publishing on this disease are often the practical next contact when no trial is listed.
Other registries (secondary)
Broader net from EU CTIS, ISRCTN, and ICTRP when available — deduped against ClinicalTrials.gov IDs already counted above. Dual-model LLM relevance gates what we keep. These rows are not added to the interventional headline.
raw 0 · after dedupe 0 · already on CT.gov 0 · kept 0 · parent 0 · uncertain 0 · dropped 0 · fetched 2026-07-30
Source notes: ictrp: Error: ICTRP public search unavailable (WHO portal is SPA-only; SOAP needs partnership). Tried: https://apps.who.int/tri
No secondary-registry studies passed dual-model relevance for this condition name (after dedupe).
Where to find support
Condition-specific patient organisations, when Orphanet lists them, are on the disease’s Orphanet page. We also link umbrella groups that support undiagnosed and ultra-rare families.
Orphanet entry for Fourth branchial cleft anomaly — check Associations / patient organisations on that page.
India — NPRD
Last verified 2026-07-26This ORPHAcode is not on our curated NPRD list (direct or Mondo-parent match). That does not decide clinical eligibility; families in India should ask a notified Centre of Excellence about current coverage.
Hand-curated for this project. ORPHAcode mappings are best-effort and may be incomplete or imprecise for umbrella categories. Parent (Mondo) matches mean the policy lists a broader category — confirm eligibility with a Centre of Excellence. Financial entitlements summarised from public policy statements and may change. This is not official government guidance.
How we counted this
Europe PMC query (preferred label + any corrected label + Orphanet and Mondo exact synonyms, stoplisted; unioned with resolved MeSH labels when available). UMLS / OMIM / NCIT cross-references are stored on the overview but are not added to the query string.
"Fourth branchial cleft anomaly" OR "Fourth branchial cleft cyst" OR "Fourth branchial cleft fistula"
ClinicalTrials.gov query (quoted phrases + MeSH via query.cond, plus recall-expansion terms when used):
"Fourth branchial cleft anomaly" OR "Fourth branchial cleft cyst" OR "Fourth branchial cleft fistula"
Study-type breakdown: 0 interventional · 0 observational · 0 expanded access. Only interventional studies enter the trial headline.
Query health: ok — strategies attempted: phrase; with hits: phrase
Run this search on ClinicalTrials.gov
Confidence reasoning
- Preferred label is multi-word and distinctive
- No synonyms dropped by stoplist
- No label/synonym collisions with other diseases in this corpus
Ingested 2026-07-27T07:49:55.727Z