Prioritizing Patients: Some Critical Factors
Safety and quality of care have always been important priorities
for the Smile Train.  Our
Safety And Quality Improvement Protocol, developed by The Smile
Train's Medical Advisory Board, sets the standard for safe, smart,
high-quality cleft care in the developing world and is used by hundreds
of Smile Train partners to guide their cleft care programs.
The Medical Advisory Board continually reviews and improves the
Safety And Quality Improvement Protocol based on information received
from local partners and on new research findings. One such recent
review has resulted in a new policy on the age of eligible patients.
As of September 1, 2002, The Smile Train only funds the care of
patients who are between 3 months and 18 years old.
"By targeting the care of children, The Smile Train and its
partners will have a better opportunity to provide the complete
spectrum of high-quality cleft care." – Joseph McCarthy,
M.D.
The Medical Advisory Board adopted this policy for several reasons.
First, The Smile Train's mission is to support treatment for children
with cleft lip and palate and this policy on patient age will help
us stay true to our purpose. Second, the earlier children with clefts
receive treatment the better their chance for full rehabilitation,
including speech development.
"By targeting the care of children, The Smile Train and its
partners will have a better opportunity to provide the complete
spectrum of high-quality cleft care," states Dr. Joseph McCarthy,
Chairman of The Smile Train Medical Advisory Board. "Our overriding
interest is in the best outcomes for our patients, and these can
be achieved by performing surgery on children, followed by appropriate
rehabilitative care as needed."
Of course, the Medical Advisory Board is aware of the risk that
general anesthesia can cause for young children. Because of this,
the Board recently strengthened the Safety And Quality Improvement
Protocol's already-strict guidelines for the provision of safe anesthesia
care by clarifying the post-anesthesia care roles for both surgeons
and anesthesiologists. Judy O'Young, M.D., a member of the Medical
Advisory Board, describes the guidelines and how to meet them in
the Summer 2002 issue of Fast Track.
Additional resources for partners on safe pediatric anesthesia
include The Smile Train's online Cleft Library. This library contains
tens of thousands of pages of invaluable cleft medical content from
the top medical journals in the world.
With these new guidelines in place and with a clear focus on those
who can benefit the most from surgery and post-surgical therapy,
The Smile Train looks forward to continuing to help improve the
safety and quality of cleft care around the world.
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