LWB Community Blog

During last year’s Cleft Medical Exchange, we met a baby girl born with cleft lip and palate named Faye. When Faye’s family brought her to the hospital in Gansu, she was just eight months old and one of three daughters in a farming family. To make additional money to support his little girls, Faye’s father made noodles in Beijing, so he rarely returned home to Gansu. However, Faye’s dad wasn’t about to let his baby girl have surgery without him, so he traveled 1,500 km to be with her.

Two weeks ago, our 2018 Cleft Medical Exchange wrapped up a very successful trip to Lanzhou, China. Fifty-two children were able to receive life-changing cleft repair surgery!

Day Four of our 2018 Cleft Medical Exchange is now a wrap, and today nine more children received surgery today.  The team is feeling very tired, but everyone is determined to see the rest of the children healed who qualified for surgery.

Tuesday was a truly great day in Lanzhou, with a whole lot of healing going on. Friendships are being made among the families and caregivers waiting for their children to have surgery, and the whole mood of the hospital was one of excitement.

Our 2018 LWB Cleft Exchange is now underway in Lanzhou, China. We’re excited to be partnering with the Gansu Provincial Hospital this week to help over 50 orphaned and rural children receive cleft lip and palate surgeries. Sunday began with the official opening ceremony, and we’re very grateful to everyone at the hospital for the warm welcome they extended to our team. Following the official ceremony, it was time to meet and screen the first patients on our list.

As 2017 draws to a close, it is a perfect time to reflect back on the year’s highlights. Every year we go through thousands of pictures taken in our programs to bring you our much-anticipated Top Ten Photos.  As you look at the children’s beautiful faces, we hope you will realize our life-changing work is only possible because of your kindness and support. Please enjoy a few of our Top Ten Photos of 2017 and click here to visit our website to see them all!

All the members of our medical team have arrived safely in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Phnom Penh is the country’s largest and most densely populated city, with over 1.5 million people calling it home. Children will be coming here from all over Cambodia to have surgery this week. Our team photographer, Sherri Cox, snapped some pictures around town to give everyone a feel for where all the excitement will be happening.

In many countries around the world, superstitions abound surrounding children born with medical needs. In Africa for example, it’s frequently thought that children born with birth defects are a result of witchcraft. In China, thousands of babies are abandoned each year by families who believe it’s the only way to remove the “curse” that someone has placed on them. In Cambodia, a country where many believe strongly in reincarnation, people often believe children are born with birth defects as punishment for something the baby did in his or her previous life. The sad reality is that as long as people don’t have access to accurate medical knowledge about special needs, superstition and fear will prevail.

For the last thirteen years, LWB has sent medical teams to China to provide life-changing surgeries to both orphaned and rural children. In 2016, when we began our work in other countries, we immediately set a goal to expand our international outreach with this essential program as well. Many emails were sent to hospitals and organizations throughout southeast Asia introducing LWB and our Cleft Medical Exchange program. In February, we found the perfect opportunity for LWB’s first surgical trip outside of China.  Our team is very excited to partner with a wonderful organization called Smile Cambodia.

Babies who are born with cleft lip or palate often have difficulty gaining weight. This leads to babies with cleft being diagnosed as failure to thrive and even sadly passing away. We are hoping to prevent this problem by bringing cleft bottles to children in Asia.