Rare diseases · Sign or symptom
Low anterior hairline
Low frontal hairline
HP:0000294
What it means
Distance between the hairline (trichion) and the glabella (the most prominent point on the frontal bone above the root of the nose), in the midline, more than two SD below the mean. Alternatively, an apparently decreased distance between the hairline and the glabella.
This feature gives the appearance of a short forehead. It is distinct from hirsutism of the forehead. In the latter, orientation of hair growth is lateral and texture and density of hair differs from scalp hair.
Rare diseases that can present with this43
Very common80–99%
12- 6q terminal deletion syndrome
- Acrofacial dysostosis, Palagonia type
- Cantú syndrome
- Cerebello-oculo-facio-genital syndrome
- Cohen syndrome
- Cornelia de Lange syndrome
- Distal 16p11.2 microdeletion syndrome
- Focal facial dermal dysplasia type I
- Gorlin-Chaudhry-Moss syndrome
- Nijmegen breakage syndrome
- Ring chromosome 7 syndrome
- Trisomy 4p syndrome
Common30–79%
14- 21q deletion syndrome
- Coffin-Siris syndrome
- DOORS syndrome
- Dubowitz syndrome
- Early-onset epileptic encephalopathy-cortical blindness-intellectual disability-facial dysmorphism syndrome
- Hereditary sensory and autonomic neuropathy due to TECPR2 mutation
- LIG4 syndrome
- Mucopolysaccharidosis type 1
- Prolidase deficiency
- Saethre-Chotzen syndrome
- Severe intellectual disability-corpus callosum agenesis-facial dysmorphism-cerebellar ataxia syndrome
- Treacher-Collins syndrome
- Trisomy 20p syndrome
- Ventricular extrasystoles with syncopal episodes-perodactyly-Robin sequence syndrome
Sometimes5–29%
16- 2q23.1microduplication syndrome
- 2q31.1microdeletion syndrome
- Congenital generalized lipodystrophy
- Congenital muscular dystrophy with intellectual disability and severe epilepsy
- Craniofaciofrontodigital syndrome
- Developmental delay-facial dysmorphism syndrome due to MED13L deficiency
- Global developmental delay-visual anomalies-progressive cerebellar atrophy-truncal hypotonia syndrome
- Growth delay due to insulin-like growth factor type 1 deficiency
and 8 more in this range
The range is how often this sign appears among people diagnosed with each disease — it is not a probability of having any of them. Many of these signs also occur in common, non-rare conditions, and Orphanet separately records 1 disease where this sign is specifically absent. A sign on this page is a conversation to have with a clinician, not a conclusion.
Part of the broader category
Also called: Low-set frontal hairline
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Start free with EleplanThis page uses the Human Phenotype Ontology (2026-06-23) — Human Phenotype Ontology Consortium, hpo.jax.org. Disease associations from Orphanet (INSERM), CC BY 4.0. Content is educational and is not medical advice.