Volume 8 | Issue - 8
Volume 8 | Issue - 8
Volume 8 | Issue - 7
Volume 8 | Issue - 7
Volume 8 | Issue - 6
Background: There is a high prevalence of cleft palate & Velopharyngeal surgeries and significant variation in the evaluation methods and reporting speech results after surgical intervention. Hence, current study was conducted to determine the common practices of craniofacial professionals in evaluating and reporting the speech outcomes after cleft palate and Velopharyngeal surgery. Methods: This cross-sectional study using purposive sampling recruited a sample of N=96 professionals from Cleft Lip and Palate Association of Pakistan Hospital (CLAPP Hospital, and General Hospital Lahore from July to December, 2021. Basic Demographic sheet and a self-structured reliable tool was used for data collection with CVI 0.96 and Cronbach alpha value of 0.7 calculated through SPSS. Sample included Speech-Language Pathologists, Plastic surgeons and Otolaryngologists of both genders, having at least 1 year experience of working in the field. SPSS Version 21 was used for data analysis. Chi-square test was used to see associations. P<0.05 was considered significant. Results: Ninety-six questionnaires were completed. The majority of respondents reported to include: perceptual the pharyngeal flap as the most often performed VPI surgery. Most respondents reported evaluations evaluation, intra-oral examination and nasopharyngoscopy. Reported criteria for surgical success included “improved” and “acceptable”. Majority of the participants believed that surgical success should be determined by speech-language pathologist and also by the treating surgeon and the patient/family. Conclusion: There is inconsistency in the definition of success & marked inconsistency in the way speech outcomes are being evaluated and reported necessitating reliable speech assessment protocol to evaluate the Velopharyngeal function. This will allow relevant and meaningful comparisons between procedures, surgeons, and the clinical centers which can contribute in determining which procedures actually result in the best speech outcomes for variety of patients with cleft palate and Velopharyngeal insufficiency.