Legal considerations in the management of cleft lip and palate

To inform professionals providing care to individuals with cleft lip and palate on the legal aspects and organizations available to protect individuals with this alteration, and to advocate that cleft lip and palate should be considered a handicap, even though it is provisional and may be rehabilitated, to assure afflicted individuals basic rights and complete personal, social, and economic welfare.

Literature review on the issue, including assessment of national and international laws, doctrines, and jurisprudences; conceptual analysis of the word "handicapped" in dictionaries. Analysis included the federal constitutions of Brazil, France, Argentina, Spain, Cuba, Italy, China, Portugal, Japan, Great Britain, and Colombia, regarding the protection of handicapped people.

Constitutional protection of handicapped people is a recent issue that has been addressed only in the last few decades in some countries such as Brazil, Italy, Spain, China, and Portugal. The Brazilian Federal Constitution of 1988 addresses the protection of handicapped people to assure them access to social and individual rights, freedom, security, welfare, development, equality, and justice as supreme values of a fraternal, pluralist, and prejudice-free society.

Individuals with cleft lip and palate should be included in national policies for integration of handicapped people, in agreement with programs of human rights, establishing a collaborative action between state and society. This would assure their inclusion in the socioeconomic and cultural context and equal opportunities in society, without privileges or paternalism.