Agonizing by the experience of helplessness and ignorance upon the birth of her cleft lip and palate baby that resulted in unnecessary sufferings to the child, and discovered it a great relief for meeting the parents who speak her language at cleft clinic, a parent conceived in her mind an idea to gather the parents and form a self-help organization. Subsequently, with the assistance of Dr. Sik-kuen CHOW and Dr. Nigel King, a group of parents with cleft lip and palate children gathered for the first time at the YMCA clubhouse in Salisbury Road on 21st December 1991 for a meeting of this purpose. Then an executive committee of 10 people was elected out of the 90 attendants (27 families). The Hong Kong Parents’ Association for Cleft Lip and Palate Children was then established with the aim to promote the support and experience-sharing among the parents so that the affected children may have better care taking and rehabilitation. In June 1997, the name of the organization was changed to ‘Hong Kong Association for Cleft Lip and Palate’ to match up with the scope of services and future development.
In mid 2001, the Association was successfully approved for hiring at welfare rent the ground floor unit at Wang Tau Hom Estate, and a sum of $600,000 was allocated for renovation and fitting-out of the service centre by the Hong Kong Jockey Club Charity Trust. Thus the service centre came into operation on 19th January, 2002, which denoted that the Association can provide a more complete service to the members and patients of clefts.
Up to early 2020, the Association’s membership has soared to 1300 families, supporting the patients and parents in Hong Kong, as well as from Mainland China and Macau.