hidden cleft palate

[Nancy]

My niece has been ill since she was born. She has always spit
up through her nose. She is now 14 months old and still food
comes out of her nose on occasion(almost always milk, sometimes
medicine or actual food, like pasta and bananas)She has had
pneumonia 3 times(hospitalized 2 times for it), bronchitis 2
times, and several ear infections. She has just seen an ENT
because her pediatrician found a split uvula. He suspects a
hidden cleft palate (he called it Sub-mucous I think). He said
the muscles in her palate did not form properly. Has anyone ever
heard of this? He is going to perform an exploratory procedure
under anesthesia because he says babies who have this can have
laryngeal spasms and stop breathing and lose their airway.
Outside of surgery they would risk fatality. He said that if she
has this she will always need speech therapy to strengthen the
muscles of her palate as well as help her speech. He also said
that if she did have this it would be very important to inform
anyone who examined her that they should be careful of her throat
area as they could cause laryngeal spasms and her tonsils and
adenoids should never be removed. Please give me some ideas of
where to go for more info on this topic.

[Judy Parker]

Nancy,



I certainly have heard of this, but not to the extent that
your explained. Keifer's ENT doctor told us he may possible have
a sub-mucouse cleft palate and even a scope was placed down his
nose to take a look, but he would not give them the speech they
needed to make a possible diagnosis. Even as yet , they do not
know but take a look at the information Mr. Waters gives under my
last posting, and also look into velophayngeal deficiency. I hope
it is not true the tonsils should not be taken out because this
is the very first thing that was done to my son. Yes, the
information out there is very limited, and i am still searching
in the area. If you come across any information, please email at
fenmart@islc.net, to reach me or my family as we are in a
transition move from overseas. I have a email address that is
good for two more weeks in the meantime at
parker00@marinemwr.or.jp