Eye Donation
The Wonderful Sense of Sight
“Of all the senses, sight must be the most delightful”, said Helen Keller. Keller is known to the world as the lady who overcame deafness, muteness and blindness to become a beacon of inspiration to millions.
In her struggles, Keller was helped by a fantastic teacher dedicated to mentoring her, educated and understanding parents, and many good friends.
Not every blind person is so fortunate. There are millions around the globe who suffer daily from the great handicap of blindness.
Blindness – World Statistics
The number of blind in the world is close to 40 million. Due to the bigger populations in developing countries and the greater probability of their people being affected, there are significantly more numbers of the blind in these nations.
India’s Visual Handicap
With its over 15 million blind, India is the country with the largest number of blind persons in the world.
A significant percentage of this blind population can have their sight restored through corneal transplantation, in which the cornea from the eye of a donor is grafted onto that of the blind person. Such being the case, it is tragic that the country has an acute shortage of donor eyes.
Thousands who have registered with eye banks have to wait for years - often in vain - for donor eyes. This is in stark contrast to our neighbour, Sri Lanka, where Buddhism and the great importance it lays on giving, has ensured that the number of eyes donated is 10 times their national requirement.
Causes of Blindness
The leading causes of blindness are cataract, glaucoma, age-related macular degeneration, corneal opacities, diabetic retinopathy, trachoma, and eye conditions in children such as that caused by vitam Read more...
Corneal Blindness
Corneal blindness is the loss of vision of the cornea, the focusing element of the camera that is the eye. If the cornea is damaged or becomes cloudy, vision is dramatically reduced or lost.
The co Read more...
Corneal Transplantation
A corneal transplant, also known as corneal grafting or keratoplasty, is an operation that replaces the opaque cornea with a clear cornea obtained from a human donor.
Corneal grafting improves vis Read more...
Eye donation
Eye donation is the act of voluntarily donating one’s eyes. Since the eye is taken after the death of the person who has pledged it, it costs him or her absolutely nothing and is yet of immeasur Read more...
Corneal Transplant - The Operation
Keratoplasty is a fairly simple though delicate surgery of the eye carried out under local or general anaesthesia depending on the age and condition of the patient.
First, a small circular knife kn Read more...
Synthentic corneas
Synthentic corneas are made use of in cases where there have been several graft failures or where the risk for grafting is high. Their main advantage is that they are biocompatible, preventing complic Read more...
Eye Banks
Eye banks store eyes received from donors for later use. However, like blood banks, they are also involved in much more than storage. Eye banks facilitate the removal, processing, evaluation and distr Read more...
Srilanka - A success story
The cultural identity of a people is, probably, one of the most important factors that determine the destiny of their nation. For instance, it is easy to see why in the US, where individualism rules, Read more...
What India Needs ?
If India is to ever to become self-reliant in terms of donor eyes, it would take a earth-shaker like Silva …or consistent efforts by every government, over many years, to effect a sea-change in Read more...