When My Child Was Born: Cross-Cultural Reactions to the Birth of a Child with Cleft Lip and/or Palate

Abstract

Objective: To compare across cultures the maternal reactions toward the birth of children with cleft lip and/or palate. Design: An adaptation of When My Child Was Born, a Likert-type scale designed to assess reactions to the birth of a child, was used to survey the target populations. Setting: The surveys were administered between February 2006 and February 2008 at four hospitals: the Faculty of Medicine Hospital, Chiang Mai, Thailand; Sappasitprasong Hospital, Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand; the No. 5 Affiliated Hospital to Xinjiang Medical College, Urumqi, China; and Santa Monica Hospital, Pereira, Colombia. Participants: Thai (n  =  22), Chinese (n  =  25), Uygur (n  =  15), and Colombian (n  =  36) biological mothers completed the survey. A historical cohort of American mothers (n  =  99) was used for comparison. Main Outcome Measure(s): The primary study outcome measure was the mean maternal affect score, which was calculated from the individual responses of study participants. Results: The mean maternal affect scores for the Thai, Chinese, Uygur, and Colombian mothers were 3.68 ± 0.38, 2.97 ± 0.52, 3.40 ± 0.47, and 3.51 ± 0.61, respectively. The American cohort score was 3.44 ± 0.67. Analysis of variance testing indicated that these groups were not equal (p < .0001). There were statistically significant differences between groups (p < .05). Conclusions: Maternal reactions to the birth of cleft children are different across cultures. These differences must be considered when administering care on international surgical missions.