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In observance of World Sight Day…Free eye screening outreach to help combat visual impairment
Eighty percent of all visual impairment can be prevented or cured. This is according to the World Health Organisation [WHO]. WHO has also revealed that 285 million people are estimated to be visually impaired worldwide. Of these, 39 million are blind and the remainder has low vision.
WHO has been able to ascertain that 82 percent of people living with blindness are aged 50 and above. It has been established, too, that 90 percent of those who are visually impaired live in low-income settings.
Guyana, like a number of other countries throughout the world, has been taking a deliberate stance to help combat visual impairment. Taking the fight head-on is Dr. Shailendra Sugrim, Head of Ophthalmology Department of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation [GPHC]. Efforts in this regard will be particularly emphasized tomorrow when World Sight Day is commemorated.
World Sight Day is an international day of awareness, held annually on the second Thursday of October to focus attention on the global issue of avoidable blindness and visual impairment. The Day is usually commemorated with an Eye Screening Event that will focus on, among other things, having diabetics check their eyes for Diabetic Eye Disease.
This year, the theme is ‘Make Vision Count – a call to educate the public about preserving vision’.
Dr. Sugrim has revealed that the Ophthalmology Department will not merely be rendering its services within the walls of the GPHC but rather, in collaboration with the Public Health Ministry, an outreach has been planned for the Giftland Mall, Turkeyen, East Coast Demerara.
GPHC’s head of Ophthalmology, Dr. Shailendra Sugrim
It is expected that a number of people will take advantage of free diabetic eye tests and general eye screening services as they go about their business in the popular mall.
Screening will be done by the Staff of the Department of Ophthalmology between the hours of 10:00 hours and 15:00 hours. Ophthalmologists, optometrists, doctors and nurses of the GPHC Eye Clinic will perform general eye screening and diabetic eye screening on the ground floor between Zoon and Shopper’s Pharmacy at the mall.
Aside from members of the public, officials of the Ministry of Public Health are also expected to grace the event to have their eyes screened.
Also at the University of Guyana, the School of Optometry students will be conducting World Sight Day Commemorative Activities on campus. Local Optometrists and Optical Shops are also expected to be involved in eye screening activities at various locations in Georgetown.
According to WHO, globally uncorrected refractive errors are the main cause of moderate and severe visual impairment. However, cataracts remain the leading cause of blindness in middle and low income countries much like Guyana. But based on global estimates, WHO have concluded that the number of people visually impaired from infectious diseases has reduced in the last 20 years.
This development might be due to the deliberate efforts being made to address this dilemma.
Dr. Sugrim revealed that over the past year the Ministry of Public Health with the support of the World Diabetes Foundation, Orbis International and University of Toronto Banting and Best Diabetes Centre, has implemented the Guyana Diabetic Retinopathy Screening and Treatment Programme which aims to have persons with diabetes undergo free screening tests to detect early diabetic eye disease (diabetic retinopathy) before it proceeds to cause permanent blindness.
Efforts in this regard will be amplified as World Sight Day gets underway tomorrow.
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