John M Barrows on behalf of the International Eye Foundation

 

Aim

To eliminate cataract blindness in Udhampur, India

 

The project

Founded in 2000, the Udhampur Rotary Eye and ENT Hospital (REH) in Northern India is a 25-bed multispecialty secondary hospital that aims to provide care for the highly underserved communities in surrounding mountainous communities. The REH served 30,000 patients and performed 1,900 surgeries in 2019, but plans to increase the number of examinations and surgeries by an additional 33% by 2022 in order to eliminate cataract blindness.

In view of this, this initiative aims to increase the number of cataract surgeries in REH through operating room renovations and by purchasing a microscope, medical consumables and inventory that will increase the number of cataract surgeries performed in a day from 45 to 60. This project is as part of a longer-term initiative to establish Blindness Free Villages in Udhampur, India.