I’m Myron Belfer, a child psychiatrist who worked for many years as the consultant to the Plastic Surgery Service at Children’s Hospital. The clinic specialized in treating craniofacial deformities in children.

How did you get involved with that population?
In the 1970s, I was hired to work specifically with the Plastic Surgery Service. When Dr. Joseph Murray was the chief of plastic surgery he would introduce me as part of the team and say, “This is Dr. Belfer, he’d like to talk to you about concerns you might have, and tell you a little bit about the process of going through the surgery. If you have any psychological concerns, he will discuss these with you.” At that time, we also had the luxury of having a psychologist, a social worker and a dedicated nurse working as a team. So, we could address the needs of the family and child… We tended to see almost all the patients who came into the clinic as part of the routine assessment, but we did focus more on kids with significant cranio-facial deformities who might undergo one or more major procedures, and we also saw those children where families or the child themselves presented with concerns about psychological adaptation.