Various problems in the development of the child with clefts from the viewpoint of rehabilitative education]

Extensive studies and experience of many years evidence that optimal rehabilitation of the cleft patient may be achieved above all by early complex measures on the part of the sciences involved. To evaluate the efficiency of logopaedic early treatment in the cleft patient, the development of cleft children was studied during the first scholastic years, special attention being paid to their learning how to manage the written language (reading and spelling). A comparative study was undertaken in cleft children and children with normal speech at the beginning and during the third year of school education, assessing their discriminating performance in speech-motor, phonemic, visual, musical and rhythmical fields (modified Breuer-Weuffen test) and their performance in reading and spelling. The results obtained permitted to draw conclusions as to the early education of cleft patients.