Charity programme brings smiles back to 1,200 children with maxillofacial deformities

Illustrative image (Photo: National Children's Hospital)

Hanoi (VNS/VNA) - The National Children's Hospital cooperated with experts from the Noordhoff Craniofacial Foundation (NCF) in Taiwan (China) to provide free examinations and surgeries for children with complicated maxillofacial deformities from December 4 to December 7.

During the programme, Vietnamese and Taiwanese doctors provided examinations to 60 children and 25 successful surgeries for complicated maxillofacial deformities.

Common deformities include cleft palate surgery, lip and nose correction, arch bone grafting, and large perforation after cleft palate surgery, especially double jaw bone surgery for children with deformed faces and misaligned bites.

Doctor Nguyen Thi Ngoc Lan, deputy head of the Faculty of Odonto-Stomatology, National Children's Hospital, said that about 1,200 children have undergone surgery for maxillofacial deformities within the framework of the cooperation programme between the hospital and NCF since 2018.

After cooperating with NCF, the Department of Odonto-Stomatology has applied the latest treatment protocols and techniques of Chang Gung Hospital and Professor Lun Jou Lo in the management, surgery, and long-term follow-up management for patients with congenital maxillofacial malformations. In particular, the Odonto-Stomatology faculty has developed a management protocol for cleft lip and palate patients from infancy to adulthood. The number of patients undergoing surgery and monitoring at the hospital has increased along with the quality assurance process, bringing prestige to the Faculty of Odonto-Stomatology and the National Children's Hospital, according to Lan.

NCF is committed to providing free surgery for 500 children yearly in Vietnam and regularly organising online consultations between doctors of the Department of Odonto-Stomatology, the National Children's Hospital and experts from the Center for Craniofacial Reconstruction - Patients Chang Gung Memorial International Institute.

In addition, NCF also donated a flexible bronchoscope to diagnose children with cleft palate and palatal hypoplasia with equipment and treatment procedures that are unprecedented in hospitals in Vietnam.

In the coming years, NCF will strengthen closer cooperation with the National Children's Hospital by sponsoring the costs of surgery, speech therapy, and diagnostic endoscopic for patients./.

VNA