The surgical-induced animal models are always used as experimental animals in the research of clinical therapeutics of lip and palate cleft disease. Choosing appropriate animal model is important for obtaining a reliable result which can be applicable to human beings. The present paper introduced and classified several surgical- induced animal models of lip and palate cleft as critical size defect, such as primate animal, rat, cat, dog, and rabbit, listed the methods of operation to create a lip and palate cleft model, the advantages and disadvantages, the principles of choosing an appropriate animal model, which helped the researchers to choose the experimental animal more targeted.
