Manchester Dental Researchers Awarded Grant to Investigate Timing of Cleft Palate Surgery
Dental researchers in Manchester have been awarded funding to investigate the impact of timing on cleft palate surgery. Researchers from the Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Trust and the University of Manchester have been awarded a grant worth in excess of £5 million to investigate the timing of surgery for children with a cleft palate.
Funding has been provided by the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, which is part of the National Institutes of Health in the USA. The cash injection will enable a team of researchers to complete extensive research on the timing of surgery in infants over the course of the next five years. The project will be known as Timing of Primary Surgery for Cleft Palate (TOPS).
The aim of the trial will be to compare the effects of surgery on infants at different ages, most notably at 6 and 12 months of age.
Led by Honorary Professor William Shaw and Honorary Senior Lecturer Dr Gunvor Semb, the research team will be analysing and evaluating data related to a broad spectrum of areas including clinical genetics, audiology, speech and language and orthodontics.
The information obtained by the team will hopefully help to inform decision making in the future. At present, there is no reliable data related to the timing of surgery that highlights benefits of intervention at one age or another.
Professor William Shaw said the main objective is to determine whether there is a significant difference in speech and language development in children who had surgery at different ages.
An international group of 550 children was recruited to take part in the trial. Babies were divided into two groups and randomly assigned an age to have surgery (either at 6 or 12 months of age). The aim is to monitor the development of the children using evaluation techniques at the ages of 12 months, 3 years and 5 years.
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