McCord Provincial Eye Hospital continues with the fight against blindness through a series of events around this year’s World Sight Month – with a big event on the World Sight Day (WSD) that took place on Thursday the 11th October 2018.
The Eye Hospital aims to educate the community about the various eye sight conditions and its impact to South Africans. Most people don’t know the conditions which could lead to blindness, which leads to them coming in to the hospital very late and the condition is severe sometimes and in advanced stage.
This is part of a global initiative with the eye care leading organisation, the International for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) to raise awareness for Eye Care Everywhere – as this year’s theme.
The Department of Health in partnership with local Optometrists, the Brien Holden Vision Institute, Al-Imdaad Foundation and International Islamic Relief Organization of Southern Africa ran a series of outreach awareness campaigns. On the 10th October 2018 they visited the old age home, Verulam Day and Frail Care Centre, Thursday the 11th October was the main WSD event at Bridge City Mall and Friday the 12th October they were at Imbaliyethu Primary School in Klaarwater.
The main event at Bridge City commenced with a talk by McCord Hospital Ophthalmologist, Dr K Moodley at 09h00am, then the screening continued till 15h00pm. The target for the three days was to screen above 200 people in each event.
Talks were held from Monday to Friday within the hospital, which were done by the ophthalmic nurses for different topics. The target for 2018 was to do 200 cataract surgeries for this eye week.
The purpose for the outreach programs is to encourage the community to visit the health facility to have check-ups at least ones a year.
