Show your support as a health professional
People with disfigurement can face discrimination and prejudice in society and this can result in social and psychological problems
Present health and social care services tend to focus on the medical treatment of disfigurement and do not give adequate attention to the psychological and social impact of disfigurement. .
To ensure the effective rehabilitation of people with disfigurements it is important to:
- Find out more about disfiguring conditions so you can offer realistic information about these conditions and their treatments
- Encourage patients to develop a positive set of beliefs about their future and use positive language about disfigurement rather than stigmatising words like “defect”, “abnormality” and “deformity”.
- Make sure that patients have access and psychological and social support.
- Lend your face to our collage to signify your support – our goal is to get 100,000 faces
Your Comments
If you are struggling to cope and you would like to speak to someone in confidence, please call 0845 4500 275 or email info@changingfaces.org.uk. Please note, we are not able to contact anyone after they have left a message on this board.
anthony bewley, 45, Barts and the London NHS Trust
I have been working with Changing Faces for some time and am convinced that their work is invaluable. One of Changing Faces' Colleagues, Cathy Farrell, and I have been working with medical students at Barts and the London NHS Trust for the last 10 years. Students have found the challenges facing young and older people with a disfigurement to be very telling. Assumptions that we can make about coping with a disfigurement can be informed by the media, prejudices, peer pressure and a variety of influences. Changing Faces, happily, is addressing those assumptions. Few medical schools specifically train medical students about a non-patronising approach to disfigurement, and fewer still have that training delivered by Changing Faces, who are the experts often with personal experiences of disfigurement.
Fernando Almeida, 46, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
As an Oral and Maxillofacial surgeon, I deal constantly with some disfigurements into my specificity relative to the maxillofacial complex, which includes the SMILE. These are classified as Dentofacial Deformities. Although I didn't see any references to this kind of condition at this website, I must say this is one of the most affecting disfigurements. I am including an example of so for your appreciation. This can be viewed at http://www.cosmeticvacations.com/cosmetic_dentistry/orthognathic_surgery.php Waiting for your comments.. Fernando Almeida
BJ, 30, Sussex
Skin camouflage therapists/scn
