[Overview and follow up study of cleft patients.]

On the average 8.2 children with different types of facial clefts are born in Iceland every year, which means approximately 1.87 per 1000 births. Until just before the middle of this century most of those children were treated by general surgeons or not at all, and a few were sent abroad. Around 1950 an orthopedic surgeon with some training in plastic surgery joined the staff at Landspitalinn (University Hospital in Reykjavik). Soon practically all children with clefts were referred to him and as the only obstetrical and gynaecological and only pediatric unit in the country were stationed there, Landspitalinn became a center for cleft treatment and has remained so. The senior author (AB) took over the treatment of clefts between 1955 and 1960 and treated about 90% of the children until 1993. The aim of the paper is to give an overview over treatment of clefts in Iceland over this period. Landspitalinn was founded in 1930. All hospital records for patients with clefts were looked into, classified and devided into three groups after the ICD system. A simple record was made for each patient with general informations and special records for those born between 1955-1984, 312 in all, for special scrutiny. In those records all known informations are to be found; kinship, mothers use of drugs in pregnancy, operations, time of operations and surgeon's name were recorded. The operations were devided into main groups and sub groups, auxiliary treatment was recorded as were all complications and diseases related to the clefts. It was also recorded if the cleft was a part of a syndrome or associated with other major congenital deformities. The informations so gained will be a basis for further studies related to evaluation of the treatment and further genetic studies.