Before participating in or donating to charities, it might be worthwhile to get to know the work done behind the scenes, so to speak. Teams all over the world are making it a goal to treat individuals with cleft palate the best way possible. Get to know the craniofacial team, which is a team of medical specialists that treat individuals with facial deformities including cleft palate. A typical team consists of a craniofacial surgeon, otolaryngologist (ENT), audiologist, pediatrician, pediatric dentist, orthodontist, orthodontic technician, prosthodontist, speech pathologist, psychologist, clinical genetist, social worker, and nursing officer. Together, these medical professionals can help give patients optimal results.

Charities are most often connected to craniofacial teams. If you search for craniofacial team on the World Wide Web, you will be able to find charities, which you can either donate to or participate in. Facing the World is a charity where the Craniofacial Team donates their services and charity fundraising to help with hospitalization costs as well as travel and accommodation costs.

There are several charities available online. The Smile Train is considered the world’s leading cleft charity. With this charity, 100 percent of your donation will end in programs designed to help children with cleft palate. Your donation will be used to provide free surgery (a 45 minute procedure) for children with cleft palate whose families cannot afford the treatment. A donation of as little as $250 will help greatly.

Other organizations in the United States include American Cleft Palate – Craniofacial Association and Cleft Palate Foundation; Cleft Palate – Craniofacial Center at the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine; Cleft Palate Foundation; Wide Smiles Inc. at Stockton, CA.

Another way to donate your help for cleft palate patients is to check out charity events. You can either participate in them or donate money. There is adequate information online on charity events. An example of a charity event is an event for quilters, sewers and crafters to join together, use their talents to produce pieces of art, and sell their works to fundraise for cleft palate treatments. Other charity events include concerts and campaigns.

You too can have your very own charity to raise funds for cleft palate treatment. You can create websites specifically for this cause, send out the message through powerful images, and forward letters.

Many children actually suffer from developmental articulation or phonology problems. An estimated 6 to 10 percent of all children will have a hard time learning the sounds of English and will need speech therapy, even though they do not have a cleft palate or related structural problems. This means that most individuals who have had surgery for cleft palate are likely to require speech therapy afterwards.

In some cases, a child with a cleft palate may develop compensatory articulations. He or she will generally make sounds that are farther back in the mouth or throat compared to what is normally done in normal speech. Compensatory articulations can also include snorting through the nasal passages as in a posterior nasal fricative. The consequence of having these untreated or overlooked is the child’s speech sounding incoherent when used occasionally.

Oftentimes after surgery, the child may produce nasal sounds as audible blows of air break out from the nose while he or she is talking. In this case, it is known as hypernasality. This makes the child’s speech difficult to understand and therefore pose insecurities and/or social issues. These symptoms are generally very difficult to treat and it is mainly because the surgical procedure was inadequate. Nevertheless, healthcare specialists will recommend cleft palate speech therapy. When speech therapy fails, a second surgery is usually required.

Speech therapy aims to reduce the symptoms of hypernasality, weak pressure consonants, and nasal air emission. This is usually based on trial and error.

Speech therapy can involve non-speech exercises like gagging, blowing and sucking conducted by simple devices such as straws and other objects that stimulate natural reflexes. Muscle strengthening exercises can be used to improve hypernasality, as the soft palate is also made up of muscles. The idea behind these exercises is that stronger muscles from training will eventually enhance overall speech capabilities. Newer techniques are being tried and tested in hopes to improve the function of the palate when speech impairment is present.

Furthermore, there are speech therapy methods that don’t improve function of the palate physically, but rather disguise the symptoms of hypernasality and audible nasal air emission. These methods may involve opening the mouth more frequently while talking, speaking louder, or decreasing contact pressure of the articulators while talking. Although these can be effective, children normally feel uncomfortable consciously watching their speech in those manners for long periods of time, which makes these methods difficult to apply.

When considering speech therapy it is advisable to take your child to a speech therapist as early as possible, typically when he or she is between the ages of 18 months to 2 years. This way, the therapist can offer immediate treatment, which includes language and speech stimulation games. Always see a healthcare professional for medical advice and treatment.

Before deciding on surgery, you should familiarize yourself with what cleft palate is and how it has occurred in your child. Before a child is born, the left and right areas of the roof of the mouth grow together during normal developmental stages. However, these areas don’t always end up together and therefore cause your child to be born with a separation located at the roof of the mouth or palate. It is possible that your child can have both a cleft lip and cleft palate.

The next best thing you can do is to visit a healthcare professional. Most of the time, he or she will suggest that surgery be done to repair the cleft palate. Some individuals have very minor cleft palates that actually do not require surgery. There have been medical advances developed over the years to treat children with cleft palate. These advancements have been designed to help children with cleft palate live healthy and overall good-quality lives.

When you are consulting with a healthcare professional, he or she will first inform you what will be used during surgery and what happens during the surgical process. You will be told what type of anesthesia will be used, what the risks are, about possible complications, how recovery will go, what the costs are and what results you can expect. More importantly, you need to ask whatever question is on your mind surrounding the whole surgery and regarding what you should do after surgery.

The surgical process for cleft lip involves an incision on either side of the cleft from the mouth into the nostril. The surgeon then turns the outer portion of the cleft down and tugs the muscle and skin of the lip together to lock the separation. This closing of abnormal separation occurring in the body is similarly done for children with cleft palate.

As with most surgical procedures, risks are involved one way or another. The aim of cleft palate surgery is to close the opening located at the roof of the mouth. However, if healing doesn’t go well after surgery, the patient may still not be able to eat or speak properly, and a second operation will need to be performed.

Sometimes rehabilitation after surgery is required. Children may develop hypernasal speech and are unable to form fricatives. Rehabilitation may involve seeing a speech pathologist, palatal training, articulation training, and non-speech exercises like swallowing, sucking, and gagging.

Most of the time, health insurance policies are able to cover most or all of the costs of surgery for cleft palate. Just to be sure, it is always a good idea to double check your policy and find out if your child is covered. There may be limitations on what kinds of treatments are covered by each policy.

What is a cleft palate?

A cleft palate is a type of clefting deformity present at birth. It is the abnormal facial formation occurring during pregnancy. Life inside the womb normally goes through sub-division in the body’s natural structure. However, development can become abnormal, causing the palate to have a gap or “hole”. A micro cleft is a minor cleft where surgery is not needed. It can be a tiny, scar-like dent on the lip. Cleft palate occurs between one in 600 to 800 births.

What are the signs of cleft palate?

A cleft palate can be an open and evident gap located at the roof of the mouth. On the other hand, it can be covered by a lining or mucous membrane at the roof of the mouth. This is called a submucous cleft and normally cannot be seen. This type of cleft has a small cleft at the tip of the hard palate, a wide or split uvula, and a thinning of the muscles covered by mucous membrane in the palate.

How can cleft palate be treated?

The ideal overall treatment for children with cleft palate comes from a multidisciplinary specialist team that specializes in the condition. This team can include surgeons, dentists, orthodontists, language therapists, audiologists or hearing specialists, geneticists, psychologists and nurses specializing in the condition. It is often advised that only professionals who specialize in cleft palate or have worked with individuals who’ve had this condition should perform surgery and care needed afterwards. If you’ve given birth to a baby with a cleft palate, the maternity hospital staff may refer you to a specialist center. In specialist centers, you will be provided with advice and support, which is extremely helpful early on.

Successful treatment for cleft palate comes from surgery that is performed right after birth. However, when a surgery can be done varies. An operation involving closing of the gap in the palate is often performed when the baby is around 6 months. During operation, the baby is asleep under general anesthetic and needs to stay in the hospital for 3 to 5 days. A baby with cleft palate often requires to be bottle-fed with special nipples.

When your child grows older, he or she may need more surgery to enhance the function of the palate as well as the appearance of the lip and nose (if both cleft lip and cleft palate are present).

What preventive measures can be done?

Your options include genetic counseling, which involves genetic testing for a family history of clefting and risk assessment, and prenatal vitamins, which include folic acid and other vitamins.

The information and options provided in this article should not be taken as medical advice and should be discussed with a medical professional first.