Volunteers from Ghana and around the world are set to  hold large-scale medical activities in Tamale to address surgical needs of Ghanaian children and adults suffering from cleft lips or cleft palate.

Cleft lips are lips that are not fully formed and cleft palates are holes in the roof of the mouth.

To assist in addressing the surgical needs of Ghanaian children and adults suffering from such facial abnormalities, Operation Smile’s team of international and Ghanaian medical volunteers will be coming to the Tamale Teaching Hospital from December15, 2013 to January 24 next year to provide free corrective surgery.

Patients from around the country will be brought by bus from the other 9 regional hospitals and screened by a multi-disciplinary medical team on January 17 and 18.

In order to secure free transport to Tamale, patients are required to pre-register before the 31st December, by calling 054 988 3835.

Transport will be provided from their nearest regional hospital to Tamale. Patients who choose for surgery would be made to stay for ten days and will be provided free meals and accommodation for the duration.

The activities also consist of two full days of screening where each child is catered for by a specialist followed by five days of surgery where anywhere from 90-130 patients will receive free surgery. 

This is conducted by a large multi-disciplinary team of 50 medical and non-medical volunteers. 

A small post operative team will remain in Tamale following the end of the mission to assess the patients after surgery.

Further assessments will take place at all regional hospitals at 6 month intervals to assess the follow up needs of the patients, including additional surgery, speech therapy, and dental care and a local team will be constantly available if any additional care is needed between the surgery and the assessments.

Operation Smile Ghana works under the umbrella of the Ministry of Health and Ghana Health Services and is committed to the creation of programs leading to the self-sustainable treatment of cleft lip and cleft palate pathologies through capacity-building and working within the existing cleft infrastructure in Ghana.

Operation Smile organizes, executes, and pays for the logistics of the programs with assistance from International and local community partners, including Auto Parts Ltd, Cowbell, Lions Club,MTN, World Vision, Consar Ltd, KPMG, DHL and many more.

Every 3 minutes, a child somewhere in the world is born with a cleft lip or a cleft palate, and 1 in 10 of these children will die before their first birthday due to the inability to feed.