Camilo Benavides is an active 16-month-old who, when he laughs, bends forward and gives his knee a slap, then grins wide with pleasure at the attention he draws from everyone around.
Even a four-hour airplane flight from his home in Alajuela, Costa Rica, couldn’t stifle his happy nature. Camilo did not cry once during the travel to San Antonio, his parents Luis and Wendy Benavides said.
Born with a cleft palate, Camilo is one of four children selected by the national nonprofit Fresh Start Surgical Gifts for cosmetic and reconstructive surgery provided at no cost in June by a surgical team at University Health in San Antonio.
Before the surgery, as the toddler explored a fitness room in a local hotel, his parents couldn’t help but tear up as they anticipated the surgery their only child would undergo the following day.
“I’m happy because he’s going to be OK, but at the same time, I feel like [there’s] a hole in my stomach,” his mother said.
In what was University’s Health’s first Fresh Start Surgery Weekend on June 24, a surgeon spent two hours to repair Camilo’s cleft palate. The program was brought to the hospital system and led by Dr. Ian Mitchell, medical director of children’s surgery.
Volunteer surgeons and nurses
In 2019, University Health made plans to participate in the programs coordinated by Fresh Start, a nonprofit that got its start in San Diego more than three decades ago and is also active in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and Chicago.
The COVID pandemic put a pause on the agreement with University Health until Mitchell left private practice and joined the staff at the hospital system late last year. His first task was to get the program going in San Antonio.
The goal is to recruit enough patients and physicians to perform the surgeries in conjunction with Fresh Start at least twice a year. The next surgery weekend is scheduled for October.
“The surgeons, the nurses, the anesthesiologist, the registration people — everyone is volunteering their time so it doesn’t cost the taxpayers anything extra,” Mitchell said. Fresh Start reimburses the hospital for its costs.
Finding specialists locally who could help was not a problem.
“It was the easiest recruitment in the history of recruitments,” he said. “No one has said no.”
Fresh Start selects the surgical candidates from among children who are uninsured or underinsured, in the United States or abroad.
“Texas is interesting — we always think, oh, kids can get Medicaid — and the answer is yes … but a lot of the things that come along with the surgery is often what puts parents in a bind,” Mitchell said.
In some cases, government-funded health care insurance will cover an implant, for example, but not the procedure to place the implant.
‘Very thankful’
Fresh Start also pays for the families’ travel expenses.
Prior to the recent surgery weekend, the Benavideses and another patient’s family traveled to San Antonio from Costa Rica. Another child and their family came in from Houston, while the fourth child is from San Antonio.
The surgery to close the hole in the roof of Camilo’s mouth, a common birth condition, will ensure the boy can eat, drink and speak without difficulty.
Two previous attempts at the surgery in Costa Rica were canceled when the boy came down with a virus and a third was called off when he did not react well to the anesthesia.
His parents worried that without surgery soon, Camilo’s speech would be delayed or affected.
Also on Saturday, Emiliano Diaz had surgery to correct syndactyly, a condition known for causing webbed or fused fingers or toes.
The 18-month-old from Heredia, Costa Rica, was born with a sixth toe fused to another toe on his right foot.
Though the condition didn’t slow down the super-energetic toddler in his home country, Emiliano may have had to wait years for surgery. That would make it more difficult to remove the toe as he grew older, his mother, Daniela Camacho, said.
“I am very, very happy, very thankful for everything that they’re doing,” she said.
Camacho said they will remain at an extended-stay hotel in San Antonio for several weeks while he’s in a cast and recovering.
A Fresh Start project manager said both boys were doing well after being discharged from the hospital.
That same weekend, surgeons also repaired a hernia in a 14-year-old boy and removed a sizable skin tag on the ear of an 8-year-old girl.
“This is a fundamental change for them,” Mitchell said, though every case is different in how the surgery improves a child’s life.
“For a girl to have something on their face, it can be truly life-changing,” he said. “They don’t have to cover their ear with their hair all the time. They can go in the pool, they can do those things that they would shy away from otherwise.”
