“Doctor, help us out and see if you can get us scheduled for surgery as soon as possible? We can’t afford to wait.” These were the most frequent words a child’s mother said to me in the clinic today, and she was very anxious because her child, who is more than five years old, has a syndactyly on his right foot and a syndactyly and missing toe on his left foot. The reason why this mother was so anxious was that she took her child to a hospital in Shanghai when he was over one year old, and the doctor said that the child had to wait until he was older before he could be operated on, so they didn’t go to another hospital and waited until now. Now that the child is more than five years old, she wants to have the surgery done before the child goes to elementary school, so she started to look for related information on the Internet, she found that it is not too early for the child to have the surgery and realized that even if the surgery is done now, it will definitely affect the child’s study, and if the child waits for the surgery to be done when the child is a little bit older, it will definitely have a greater impact on the child, and now she found that the child always falls down easily when walking. After seeing the many cases I have done, she brought her child to me, hoping that it would not affect her child’s schooling as much as possible, and it would be better to have the surgery done in the summer vacation. In fact, for congenital deformities like syndactyly, we suggest that it is best to have the surgery done before the child learns to stand or walk, because if the surgery is done before that, the child will always be held or lying down, and the foot does not need to be weight-bearing or walking, and it is easier to take care of the child after the surgery. In addition to this, having the surgery done earlier will be better for the child in terms of recovery. Of course, when the child is older, it is also possible to have a syndactyly operation. Like this little girl, her mother was very anxious to have the operation in the summer vacation because she was afraid that a late operation would affect her child’s schooling. In my clinic, I often meet adult patients who want to have syndactyly surgery, and they regret very much that they did not have the surgery when they were young, because having the surgery now will have a very serious impact on their study, work and life. Therefore, I would like to emphasize once again that no matter whether it is polydactyly, syndactyly or other congenital hand and foot deformities such as bunions, if the child meets the requirements for surgery in all aspects of his/her body, the surgery must be performed as early as possible.