Patient Stories

Early in the morning, Operation Smile’s team of medical specialists arrive at Hospital Alemán Nicaragüense to prepare for the two surgeries to be performed that day. Iris is one of…

As soon as Iris gets off the bus and, together with her mother, moves through the crowds of people at a bus station in Managua, Nicaragua, she hides. Walking behind…

Nury sits on a sofa in their home in Bogotá, Colombia, trying to recall the moment that her first-born child, Luciana, entered the world. “She was born on a Friday…

Mirna traveled for 15 hours to get to the Operation Smile medical mission in Estelí, Nicaragua today. She walked an hour and took five different buses. Along the way, she…

Felista did everything she thought she should do during her pregnancy: She ate well and received full prenatal care. She and her husband, Steve, were already the proud parents of a…

When Elisa was born, her parents, Sidonie and Jean, were overcome by sadness – their daughter had been born with a cleft lip and cleft palate, and they believed this…

While Ghana offers some of Africa’s most beautiful landscapes, it also suffers from a lack of adequate infrastructure, health care services and economic opportunities, resulting in some of the world’s…

Her name means “solution.” The moment Meheftehe was born, she was in desperate need of just that. Meheftehe suffered from a severe facial cleft which extended from her right eye…