September is Craniofacial Acceptance Month

I just discovered that September is "Craniofacial Acceptance Month". Too bad I didn't learn that before the month was already half over! Oh well, at least there's still half a month left.

Many people may wonder just what a craniofacial disorder is...

A craniofacial disorder refers to an abnormality of the face and/or the head. Cranfioracial differences can result from abnormal growth patterns of the face or the skull, which involves soft tissue and bones. A craniofacial condition may include disfigurement brought about by birth defect (such as in Rachel's case), disease, or trauma.

Often times, with such a disorder, you come under the care of a team of doctors, a craniofacial team. This team of doctors usually consist of a pediatrician, a plastic surgeon, an orthodontist, a dentist, a speech therapist, a genetist, a social worker, and an ENT. Rachel's craniofacial team is located at Loma Linda University Children's Hospital. We see the team as a whole once a year, but sometimes see one or more of the other people more often, such as the ENT who follows her hearing, and a few years ago, we were seeing the speech therapist weekly, for months!

There are a lot of great organizations out there that help and support families of craniofacial disorders. One in which is an organization that Cher works closely with after her role in the movie Mask. That organization is The Children's Craniofacial Association.