How smile made their life beautiful...

　

By Vikas Vaidya

Cleft Lip, a deformity since birth, is considered a curse in many parts of India. Particular in rural areas, parents of a girl with cleft lip face hardships in finding a groom for her. Even such girls carry the scar of rejection only because of deformity. However, ‘an angel with a scalpel’ started a kind of a revolution several years back. Late Dr Sharad Kumar Dicksheet started conducting surgery camps to correct cleft lip and other such deformities and to restore smile on faces of countless many. Today, many a generous surgeons have taken ‘smile restoration’ as a mission, making lives of several people beautiful than ever. ‘The Hitavada’ traces how surgery has changed life of those with cleft lip for the better...

Journey from scaring to caring figure

He was born with deformity. His parents thought of correcting his cleft lip and palate deformity, but as there were myths about surgeries in such cases, they did not take him to surgeons. He grew up, got job of a teacher. But, despite his loving nature, students used to run away from him as they were frightened by his appearence. He was a scaring figure for children. At the age of 55 years, he finally decided to get done the corrective surgery. He came to Mure Memorial Hospital to get done the surgery. And, it worked wonders for him. After the corrective surgery, his look changed and children got to know his caring nature. A simple corrective surgery made him a ‘caring’ figure from a ‘scaring’ one.

From sadness to smile

Sunanda Sonare (name changed) is a 24-year-old young woman. Though she is happy now, she was a broken person till some time back. Due to cleft lip, she was suffering mentally. She faced rejection by boys. She came to Mure Memorial Hospital, where doctors performed corrective surgery on her. With her smiling face restored, she went back to her village, transformed into a happy and confident person. Now proposals are coming to her as she is looking beautiful after the surgery. Her parents are very happy on this development and suggesting the other people to face the surgery.

 

When Rotary people approached a man in Bhandara to get the corrective sugery done for Cleft lip, he told them that, he was the only bread-earner for his family and cannot stay away from the home. Rotary West’s Shashank Vishvarupe offered him the daily wages of three days but still he did not turn up. The people who are suffering from this problem have other social or family commitments which are resisting them coming for the surgery.

 

There are many such examples to tell about such positive changes. This year UK’s Northern Cleft Foundation (NCF) team led by Dr George and Dr Venkat performed around 122 corrective surgeries for cleft lip and palate deformity at city’s Mure Memorial Hospital with the help of Rotary Club of Nagpur West and supported by the state government's Deputy Director of Health Services (DDHS).

Coordinator of the club Shashank Vishwarupe, Mangesh Joshi along with Dr Kiran Kulkarni and other Rotary members took lot of efforts to bring the patients to hospital. Vilas Shende, Director of Mure Memorial Hospital was a happy man. He extended all help generously. He never took any objection when his staff was used for this positive cause by Rotary. In fact he encouraged them.

 

 

How to feed babies with deformity?

Babies born with a cleft palate will have difficulty feeding and will not be able to breastfeed or take feeds from a normal bottle. Elaborating this particular procedure, Heather McClements, a trained nurse said, "The baby will be able to suck well but will not get the milk from the breast or bottle due to the cleft palate. The baby will appear to breastfeed well and will fall asleep after feeding but this will due to being tired and not from being full. Babies who are bottle fed will only manage very small amounts over a long time and again will fall asleep due to having worked hard to feed and not from being full. Although the milk does not come down the nose whilst drinking mothers will notice milk coming down the nose when the baby winds or vomits."

Over time the baby will show a very small weight gain and will be become very thin and undernourished. To avoid poor weight gain mothers should feed the baby milk from a spoon or open cup. The use of a bondla to feed the baby is very successful. Breastfeeding or bottles should not be used until the cleft palate has been repaired. Mothers can express their breast milk to give to the baby from the spoon or bondla or use formula milk. Cow’s milk should not be used until the baby is at least 6 months of age. At 4-5 months of age weaning should be introduced as normal for any other baby to help with weight gain, added Heather.

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