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| Professor Nagato Natsume (left) conducts a surgery on a child in the southern province of Bến Tre. — VNA/VNS Photo Thu Hiền |
Viet Nam News
HÀ NỘI — More than 4,000 children with harelip across Việt Nam have undergone free surgery thanks to the Japanese Cleft Palate Association (JCPA) in the past 20 years.
The information was released at a conference introducing the association’s work, held in Hà Nội on Sunday.
The number of children with this innate malformation in Asia is the highest in the world, according to JCPA.
In Việt Nam, on average, 3,000 children are born with harelip per year, and, currently, nearly 20,000 children need surgery to correct the malformation.
Japanese doctors from the association perform the surgery twice a year, in co-ordination with the Bến Tre and the Ninh Bình general hospitals.
The association also supports research related to gene analysis to determine reasons for the malformation. In addition, it has joined hands with Hà Nội Medical University to build a lingual treatment centre for children following the surgery.
JCPA is a non-profit association founded in 1992. Professor Nagato Natsume is its general secretary.
The association has conducted surgeries on a number of children in Việt Nam, as well as other countries, including Laos, Myanmar and Ethiopia. — VNS
