Question

Repair of cleft lip is usually carried out

• A. At birth
• B. At 10 weeks of life
• C. During 1.5 to 2 years of age
• D. Before the child starts going to school

Hint:

Recall the rule of tens used to time cleft lip surgery.

Answer 1

The Correct Option is B

Step 1: Understanding the Question:
The question asks about the usual time to repair a cleft lip in an infant.

Step 2: Key Formula or Approach:
Surgeons use the classic "rule of tens" to decide when a baby is fit for cleft lip surgery: age about 10 weeks, weight about 10 pounds, and hemoglobin about 10 g/dl.

Step 3: Detailed Explanation:
Repairing the lip right at birth is risky because a newborn is not yet stable for anesthesia and has not built up enough weight or blood count to heal well.
Waiting until 1.5 to 2 years of age or until the child starts school delays fixing the feeding difficulty, the visible defect, and later speech and social development, so this is not the standard practice for the lip.
That later window, around 9 to 18 months, is instead used for cleft palate repair, which is a separate operation done after the lip has already healed.
Once the infant meets the rule of tens, at about 10 weeks of age, the child is considered fit for anesthesia and surgery, so the lip repair is done at that point.

Step 4: Final Answer:
Cleft lip repair is carried out at about 10 weeks of life, once the rule of tens is met.