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About one and 700 children around the world are born with a cleft lip and palate defect every year. In Pakistan, children not only have trouble eating and drinking, they’re also facing difficult psychological and social challenges. A simple plastic surgery could correct the defect. But in Pakistan, many families can’t afford the procedure. And even if they could, there aren’t enough doctors who perform it, says experts. There’s a huge problem in terms of cleft in Pakistan. There’s some very very good local surgeons who are doing large volumes of cleft surgery. But the volume of cleft in Pakistan is so large that they cannot deal with all of these cases. Hill is part of a charity program organized by Ayesha Bashir Trust, which brings teams of doctors to Pakistan to help with the shortage of physicians. Dr. hill is one of many doctors from the United Kingdom visiting cleft Hospital Pakistan,in the north eastern city of Gujarat to perform cleft treatments for free.
It’s important I think to collaborate with new surgeons from abroad to try, and increase the training of local surgeons and that’s what we’re doing here. There’re local trainees and other local consultants that we work with. Dr. Rios who works with the charity says he’s amazed by the simple display of humanity. We need to praise the ones who come here for pure humanitarian reasons. Our senior colleague who started this whole charity in England has no connections to Pakistan, no religious reasons of being here. It is purely for humanity. And for the past 20 years, he hasn’t missed a single trip.
Sadia is here today for a checkup. Her cleft procedure was done a while ago. Her mother still remembers the pain she felt when she was born. She was born and the nurse brought her to me. I felt very sad for her. But within 10 days of her births, we were told about these doctors. We’ve got their information and brought her when she was 4 years old and her surgery was done then. Thank God for that because today she is fine. Speech therapist Dr. Rosey Slater says cleft surgery sometimes is just the beginning of the process. This surgery only does so much. Speech therapy needs to go hand and hand with the surgery. So it’s a really good opportunity to be able to come here and work as part of a team here to really help the children. The doctors visit Pakistan twice a year for a couple of weeks at a time, performing hundreds of cleft surgeries. It’s not a job, it’s a pleasure to do it. I really enjoy the surgery and, you know. I don’t think there’s anything that I do that’s more satisfying. A simple surgery and a rich reward of a lifetime of smiles.
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