About Unite For Sight, an international nonprofit organization
What is the Global Need?
The major barriers to eye care in developing countries include education and awareness, expense, distance and transportation, and, in developing countries, too few trained eye doctors. With 45 ophthalmologists, Ghana has one of the highest number of ophthalmologists in Africa. There is approximately one ophthalmologist for every 440,000 people. Liberia, in contrast, has a single ophthalmologist for the entire population of 3.5 million. In the United States, there is one optometrist or ophthalmologist for every 5,000 people, with an estimated 59,146 eye doctors for the population. Yet, despite the prevalence of doctors in the U.S., we know that more than 40 million people remain uninsured and medically underserved. Countries such as Ghana and Liberia, which have so few ophthalmologists, cannot meet the eye care needs of the majority of the population.
Further complicating the situation of lack of eye care professionals is the fact that poor patients in rural areas are usually unaware that their blindness may be curable or preventable. Even those aware of eye care services will often not pursue treatment due to fear or expense. Quality eye care and innovative outreach programs are vital in order to eliminate preventable blindness.
Unite For Sight's Goal and Model?
The goal of Unite For Sight and its partner communities and eye clinics is to create eye disease-free communities. Unite For Sight's community-based chapters in 25 countries focus on blindness prevention through education programs about nutrition, eye hygiene, and eye health. Additionally, Unite For Sight works with partner eye clinics in Ghana, India, and Thailand. Since the founding of this model nearly three years ago, more than 6,000 people have had their sight restored, and hundreds of thousands have received treatment for infections, glaucoma care, eyeglasses, and other forms of vital eye care. Unite For Sight works with eye clinics worldwide that previously attempted to provide free eye care services in their community, but were precluded by lack of staffing and funding. Unite For Sight's model is unique in that it involves sending students, nurses, public health professionals, and doctors from North America and Europe to serve as support staff to eye doctors in the field, thus enabling community-based screening programs led by eye clinics without the need for paid staff. The screenings are held in rural villages, urban locations, as well as in refugee camps. The clinic's eye doctors diagnose and treat eye disease in the field, and surgical patients are brought to the eye clinic for surgery. The average cost of sight-restoring cataract surgery in Africa and Asia is $50, which is too expensive for the majority in the developing world who live on less than $1 per day. Therefore, Unite For Sight sponsors the surgery and other eye care for the patients to insure that no person remains blind due to lack of funds. Most importantly, the Unite For Sight-sponsored patients receive the same quality of surgical care in the same facilities as those who can afford to pay.
In addition to Unite For Sight's measurable impact, there is an equally compelling achievement. Doctors, nurses, students, and others, especially younger people, are "uniting for sight" across borders, economic status, and professional lines, allowing the organization to exceed its initial objectives.
Unite For Sight's Programs Are Sustainable With A Legacy of Service and Change
Unite For Sight's partnership with eye clinics and local communities are sustainable with a legacy of service and change. The communities where we work did not previously have access to eye care due to many barriers. In Tamale, Ghana, for example, our partner ophthalmologist, Dr. Wanye, is the only eye doctor for 2 million people in the entire region. Prior to our partnership, Dr. Wanye often went months without providing a single cataract surgery because the community members could not afford the $35 cost of surgery. Unite For Sight volunteers now work with him to assist with screening outreach programs, and Unite For Sight funds the eye care for the patients. Likewise, in Sangklaburi, Thailand, one ophthalmologist visited the region for 5 days per year to provide eye care. That means that before Unite For Sight began sending optometrists to work there, not one eye care professional was present for 360 days per year. Now, the orphanage director who coordinates Unite For Sight's programs in Thailand, has developed a passion for eye care and will be starting optometry school so that Sangklaburi has a permanent eye care professional when he graduates.
At Buduburam Refugee Camp in Ghana, a dedicated group of refugee volunteers work daily to screen their local community members. Each of the volunteers participated in Unite For Sight eye education programs and received training from Dr. James Clarke, an ophthalmologist and member of Unite For Sight's Medical Advisory Board who is located 1 hour from the refugee camp. Every day, the refugee volunteers identify patients with potential eye disease, and the patients subsequently are examined by Dr. Clarke's eye nurse Margaret Duah-Mensah, who visits several times per month. Those requiring treatment and surgery are brought to Dr. Clarke, and all of their eye care expenses are funded by Unite For Sight. The program at Buduburam Refugee Camp in Ghana is so successful that patients from the neighboring country of Liberia - a country with only 1 ophthalmologist for the entire population of 3.5 million - have been reported to travel to the refugee camp just to have their sight restored through Unite For Sight's programs.
