Craniofacial Surgeon Joins Team
When Kapi‘olani Children’s Hospital put together a team to bring comprehensive care to babies born with cleft and craniofacial conditions, they assembled specialists for medical care, speech, hearing, feeding, behavioral health, pediatric dentistry, orthodontics and oral surgery, and case management in cooperation with the state Department of Health. The specialist who makes repairs to the lip and palate is the craniofacial surgeon/plastic surgeon. Hawai‘i is too small to sustain a dedicated, full-time practice in such a highly specialized field. And the idea of a team approach was incomplete if families had to endure the anxiety and expense of traveling to the Mainland for surgeries. So Kapi‘olani made the commitment to bring a craniofacial surgeon to Hawai‘i several times a year. Selected to join the team was Granger Wong, M.D., D.M.D., FACS, one of only about a hundred fellowship-trained surgeons in the field in the U.S. Dr. Wong, an associate professor at the University of California Davis, holds both medical and dental degrees. He is board certified in oral and maxillofacial surgery and plastic surgery. He now travels to Kapi‘olani several times annually to perform surgeries. Other craniofacial specialists have traveled to Hawai‘i in the past but Dr. Wong is the first to work here as part of a multidisciplinary panel. “Care for the infant is not over when we complete the surgical repair,” Dr. Wong says. “What’s needed is a continuum of comprehensive care from the outset through the teen years. The cleft panel puts Hawai‘i on par with other programs nationally.”
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