Smile Train, the world’s largest cleft-focused organization has commemorated Ghana’s 67th Independence Day with over seventy children who benefited from its free cleft care program as part of the psychosocial therapy of their care.
Many children in Ghana are said to be living with Cleft lip and palate; a birth defect that occurs when a baby’s lip or mouth does not form properly during pregnancy.
But despite available interventions through surgery and speech therapy, many go through life with this defect.
Since Smile Train’s presence in Ghana from 2006, two thousand plus children with cleft lip and or palate have been operated on with 70 done at the Greater Accra Regional Hospital in partnership with Mission Africa International.
The chief executive officer Susannah Schaeffer who was present at the event held at the Greater Accra Regional Hospital, expressed excitement about the progress of the program in Ghana so far. “In Ghana specifically we needed to invest in training and education of cleft professionals and expanding the program to be able to provide the ancillary care that’s needed to treat clefts.”
Schaeffer also added that Smile Train is “looking forward to partnerships that will mobilize patients to the centers for continuous care.”
Although clefts can be fixed with a simple surgery lasting just 45 minutes, one out of every 10 children with clefts die before their first birthday and as shared by the mothers present at the event, both parents and children with clefts are continuously stigmatized in communities.
A reconstructive plastic surgeon and smile train partner, Dr. Charles Kwame Asiedu bemoaned this attitude of some Ghanaians and called on all guardians of children with clefts to seek free treatment at the Greater Accra Regional Hospital, Korle Bu Teaching Hospital and other referral hospitals around the country.
“Cost should not be a barrier, there’s now free comprehensive cleft care such as ENT, dental treatment, speech therapy among others under the program. This has been made through partnerships such as Cleft Foundation and GRAFT Foundation.”
Globally, the smile train has performed over one point nine million surgeries for children with clefts.
Source: Ghana/Starrfm.com.gh/103.5FM/Nadima Umar Uthman
