About the Conference

While India being home for nearly 12 million blind people, more than 25% of 45 million blind people all over the world, it is not surprising that India is known as Blindness Capital of the world. But many may not know that India has the biggest eye-care infrastructure in the world, driven mainly by Community Ophthalmology. Over six million cataract surgeries are being done year after year with more than 60% of them through Non-Government Organisations! The first ever National conference on Community Ophthalmology organised by Rotary will bring out many such facts and recognise legendary Ophthalmologists who have been silently working behind this. We invite you to participate in the conference to get enlightened and join hands with us in preventing unnecessary blindness.

In 2019, India piped well past well past the WHO set target of 25% reduction in the Visual Impairment prevalence, from the line level of 2010. Blindness declined markedly by 47% and Moderate Visual Impairment more than halved (RAAB, 2019). India’s eye-care performance is stupdendous even by other measures and metrics, although they are cataract-centric. Cataract Surgical Coverage (CSC) – proportion of the affected population who could gain access to cataract surgery, is one such measure used. More than 93% of 50+ population blinded by cataract could have it operated. India has done well even on another key metric, the Cataract Surgical Rate (CSR), number of cataract surgeries performed in a year per one million population. Against the global average CSR of 1,406, India has clocked around 4,830 in 2014, only second to USA which reported a CSR of 6,353. Who are the people and organisations behind these remarkable accomplishments? What has been the role of government and INGOs / NGOs like Rotary International? How are the NGOs and Private Eye Hospitals with limited resources able to balance the service to poorer sections of the society? One can get all the answers in the first ever National conference on Community Ophthalmology.

Apart from addresses by Rotary International Leaders, Dr. Bhujanga Shetty, Chairman, Narayana Netralaya, several legends of Community Ophthalmology (CO) across India - Aravind Eye Hospital, Madurai, Rajan Eye Hospitals, Chennai, Sankara Eye Hospital, Coimbatore, Shroff Charity Eye Hospital, New Delhi, Sitapur eye Hospital, UP, Usha Kiran Eye Hospital, Mysore, IIT.IIT, a Non-Profit Company and several other leading Ophthalmologists from Bengaluru have confirmed to deliver talks to share their experiences and best practices in Community Ophthalmology different areas of Research & Innovation, Scaling up operations, Providing Multi-speciality services, Collaboration of Eye hospitals, Corporate and NGO in structured sessions.