Smile Train is a nonprofit organization. It is also a charity providing corrective surgery for children with cleft lips and palates. It is founded in 1999 and New York City is the headquarter. Smile Train provides corrective cleft surgery in 87 countries which are free, training local doctors and providing hospital funding for the procedures. According to Forbes magazine, Smile Train is the 72nd largest charity in the USA. Now real 30 Surprising Facts of Smile Train.
Table of Contents
SURPRISING Facts About Smile Train
01. You will surprise to know that 1 in every 700 children worldwide is born with a cleft lip and/or palate.
02. Each year, 170,000+ children are born with a cleft in the developing world. Most of these children will not receive the treatment they need.
03. A cleft occurs when certain body parts and structures do not fuse together in utero.
04. While we don’t know the exact cause of cleft, we know that there are many factors, including genetics, family history, environment, and nutrition which may increase or decrease the likelihood of cleft lip/palate.
05. Children with untreated clefts not only live in isolation, but also face physical difficulties with eating, breathing, and speaking.
06. Many children born with clefts don’t attend a school or even hold a job.
07. Cleft surgery is simple and the transformation is immediate.
08. An estimated more than 130,000 children affected by a cleft palate that require speech and language therapy in the developing world every year. Unfortunately, many of them cannot afford to receive it.
09. Smile Train has worked in 85+ different countries.
10. 2,100+ surgeons have partnered with Smile Train.
11. 1,100+ hospitals have partnered with Smile Train.
12. Since 1999, Smile Train has provided 1,000,000+ free cleft surgeries.
13. Every 5 minutes a Smile Train surgery helps a child in need.
14. A Smile Train sponsored cleft surgery can cost as little as $250.
15. Unlike other organizations that focus on many different things, Smile Train has one goal, to give every child born with a cleft the chance to smile.
16. Smile Train’s biggest programs are in India, China, Indonesia, and the Philippines.
17. Smile Train has provided 66,000+ free scholarships, surgical training resources, and workshops for doctors from 140+ countries.
18. Smile Train provides financial support to partner hospitals which has enabled them to build new operating rooms and to purchase cleft surgical instruments and supplies like scalpels and sutures, crucial safety equipment like pulse oximeters, and much more.
19. For children born with a cleft palate who are in need of speech therapy, Smile Train developed an App that allows them to practice their speech at home.
20. Smile Train’s first patient Wang Li received her surgery in 1999 when she was 9 years old. Today, she is a confident and beautiful woman who is married and has a young son.
21. In developing countries, Smile Train partnered with Tech Company Bio Digital, Inc. to create the first free, open-access, web-based, interactive surgical teaching tool designed to train surgeons to repair cleft lip and palate.
22. Smile Train developed a digital patient database called Smile Train Express. Our partners upload their patient records here, which allows us to review and monitor the quality of their work.
23. In 2016, supporters who organized fundraising events for Smile Train created 8,068 new smiles.
24. Students for Smile Train, Team Empower, and the Young Leadership Circle are official groups made up of Smile Train supporters who organize events and raise funds for our programs.
25. 50+ companies have partnered with Smile Train to raise funds for our programs and awareness of our brand.
26. Smile Train has many celebrity supporters including Christy Brinkley, Kylie Jenner, Graham Elliot, and Lucy Hale.
27. Smile Train offers a free online platform for supporters to create their own online fundraising pages.
28. The Empire State Building has been lit up in Smile Train colors twice! The first time was on giving Tuesday in 2015 and the second time was on World Smile Day® in 2016.
29. In 2015, a benefit for Smile Train, Denim and Diamonds was featured on the Real Housewives of New York City.
30. Smile Train Ambassador Stanley the English Bulldog was born with a cleft lip and palate and he now visits school children to promote his message of acceptance.
FAQ
A cleft happens when certain parts of a body and structures don’t fuse together during fetal development. Clefts can involve the lip and/or the roof of the mouth (It is made up of both soft and hard palate). Clefts are a common birth difference with more than 200,000+ new babies with clefts born every year globally. Due to poverty, limited awareness, and lack of available medical resources, the vast majority of these children never receive the reconstructive surgery and will live their whole lives with untreated clefts.
Brian Mullaney, Charles Wang.
Smile Train was founded in 1999 and it is a leading charity. It is helping more than 1500000 desperately poor children with clefts and training thousands of medical professionals. They are establishing hundreds of programs in the world’s poorest countries.
They felt the most organized and efficient way to offer cleft surgery was to train. They also support local doctors instead of flying in Western doctors to provide surgeries in poor, developing countries.
Smile’s Global Headquarters are located at 633 Third Avenue, 9th Floor, New York, NY 10017 in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
Since 1999, Smile Train has been committed to effectively and efficiently helping children with clefts. Smile Train regularly receives independent and unbiased high ratings from charity watchers, supporters, and publishers around the world.
In 2015, Operation Smile operated 161 successful medical missions across 112 sites in 29 countries. Operation Smile medical volunteers will perform 3,000 surgeries (First three months of 2016) over the course of 39 medical missions in 19 countries.
Without health insurance, cleft lip and/or palate surgery typically costs $5,000 to $10,000 or more per surgery. If the child has a cleft lip and a cleft palate, two surgeries typically are required for a total of $10,000 to $20,000.
YES! If anyone likes to make a donation using PayPal, please select it as your method of payment on the Donation page.
Visit here Donation form and select “Yes” for the tribute or memorial gift option.
Please call at 800.932.9541.
i. Process 01: When you make your donation online, you will automatically receive a receipt via email instantly after your donation.
ii. Process 02: If you make your donation over the phone or through the mail, as long as you provide an address with your donation, we will send a tax receipt.
Tax receipts are generated on a daily basis and depending on your location the receipt can take anywhere from 7-10 days from the deposit/processing date to be received.
Please call 800.932.9541 if you would like the other tax receipt.
US Tax ID #: 13-3661416
UK registered charity #: 1114748.
Yes, it is registered with the federal government and with every state in the US where it is essential and required. The Smile Train UK is also a registered charity in the UK.
Smile Train, PO Box 96231, Washington, DC 20090-6231.
or as little as $250 you can afford free surgery that will change a life of a child forever.
Please “Like” us on Facebook, and you can mention us in tweets by typing @SmileTrain.
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