CHILDREN WITH CHEILOGNATHOPALATOSCHISIS - ANESTHESIOLOGICAL EXPERIENCE GAINED IN 2 UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS IN ROMANIA

In two university hospitals in Romania, a German team has operated on children with cheilognathopalatoschisis. In Romania, newborn children with this anomaly used to be - and still are - separated from their pa rents and placed in state-run homes, where they suffered (suffer) seve re physical, mental and social deprivation and trauma. The programme w as designed as an initial step towards the establishment of at least o ne specialised centre for the treatment of clefts. In a preliminary st age, local oral surgical personnel were trained in Munich, and major c omponents of a completely equipped OR and anaesthesia facility taken t o Romania were left in the country. In contrast to the professional qu alifications of the anaesthesiologists, technical resources in Romania are in extremely short supply. A serious problem is the high (regiona lly more than 20 percent) rate of infection of the children from the s o-called ''Dystrophy Centres'' with HIV. The physical and mental state s of these children make particularly high demands of anaesthesiologic al care; the establishment of a specialised centre for cleft anomalies will therefore be possible only if appropriate training and equipment can be provided.