Maybe someone can help me find some info. I am good somewhat but this situation has been perplex because none of my previous research metioned this.
As I have metioned before one of my sons was born with a cleft palate. Well he has had 2 surgeries to correct this. One when he was 1 and the second when he was 3 ( a yr ago). The second surgeon did a wonderful job and up until recently we have had no problems. See after it healed the second time his mouth looked normal. Well the roof did you could hardly tell he had surgery. And within the last few months where the soft palate meets the hard palate is starting to look more jigsawy. Does that make sense? Also when he drinks water or any liquid its starting to come out his nose. Which has not been a problem eariler in the year after the second surgery. it happened alot after the first. And now we are worried that he may have to have another sugery to fix his mouth. And we go back the the surgoen again in early Dec. But in the mean time can someone help me find out if its common for this type of surgery to have to be done so many times and this close together.
Anyways so I was looking some things up and boy do things not look very good. Just read a case study about an 11 yr old boy who had 14 failed surgeries to close his cleft. His family finally found an excellent doc. in Arkansa that did the surgery and they finally had sucess. Yay for them at least they found someone that did it right.
And the liquid coming out of the nose. From what i read it sounds like he has developed a fistula. Which, from what I gather, is basically where the sutures are coming apart and is allowing liquid to come into the nasal cavity. And from what they say this can be very hard to correct and it can keep happening again and again until it is fixed right. So that also maybe playing a part in his speech problem that he still has.
Awe Rebel, I wish I knew more about this sort of thing. I remember a gal in highschool that had a cleft palet. I did not know her, I did not understand what she would say. Many people made fun of her. I did not. Quite a few years later our sons were in the same kindergarten class and other school grades. I got to know her and just focused hard, and if I did not understand, I would say so. Sometimes throwing things out to see if thats what she meant. She was used to it. I still see her here and there. I know she has a few surgeries too. I just wish I had been brave enough to get to know her in school.
Have you thought about contacting the lady that finally found a good dr. that was able to get it right. It would be worth traveling to another state for a job done well.
Unfortenutly that was a case study so they did not have a name or anything listed.
I know that there is a cleft team in FL. but we went to them from birth to 2 and I don't really like them. They are the ones that did my sons first surgery and he did a really bad job on my sons repair. I didn't know then how bad of a job they did till we went to another surgeon. As of current we go to a doctor in Augusta, Ga and while so far he has done good work I wonder how good. i know that there is another team in Savannah so I may see about getting a second opinion with them.
I understand what you mean about the girl who has the speech problems and people not understanding her. We go through that now. Our first in home threapist couldn't not understand Andrew(my son) at all. I was constantly telling her what he was trying to say. I still have to do that with hubby to this day. Its hard for him to try to intepret what Andrew says. Whats worse is when we are out in public and he tries to talk to people and they look at me funny when they have no idea what he is saying.
I know nothing at all about this. But I did do a search for cleft palate specialist. This is the first one on the list. They are in Chapel Hill, NC. I know it's a bit far from GA but never know.
I do not know where you live but Arkansas Children's Hospital is an excellent hospital. I would rate their doctors among the best of the best. We traveled there many times (from PA) after my second daughter was born and saw many different types of doctors. Everyone was excellent! I know that one of the Drs. there, Dr. Waner, who does children's surgery has recently moved to NY. I don't know if he does cleft palate or not but I know he's wonderful and is in extremely high demand.
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