Our Mission A Year of Loss & Renewal Performance Community Outreach DR Initiatives Education & Training CMEs & Publications LAICO Managed Eye Hospitals IT and Systems HR Development AMRF Aravind Eye Banks Aurolab Accolades Partners in Service Trustees and Staff	Managed Eye Hospitals Mr. Suresh Kumar and Mr.Nagarajan with the Grameen team The concept of “Managed Eye Hospitals” as another strategic direction to realize the vision of “Eliminating needless blindness” germinated in early 2005. An internal framework has been developed to partner with those who have a strong desire to serve the community and to do it in areas where eye care services are inadequate. Certainly there is no dearth of such areas. In several parts of India and other developing countries the current eye care services are at such low levels both in terms of quality and coverage, that with the normal incremental growth, the service levels will never catch up with the incidence of new cases resulting in an ever increasing number of needlessly blind people. The plan over the 10 years is to engage with 100 eye hospitals and do a million eye surgeries a year including the output from the network of Aravind owned hospitals. In the last two years, this concept is becoming a reality with several partnerships emerging. In this approach, Aravind in working with the partner takes the responsibility of establishing the eye care facility, equipping, staffing and running it. Activities involve building design, selection of local staff, training, equipment purchase, installation, and putting all the operating systems in place. Aravind places a core team of key staff and runs the eye hospital taking care of day-to-day management as well as influencing the strategic decisions. The opportunity came almost immediately, leading to a partnership with Rajiv Gandhi Foundation. Through this partnership the Indira Gandhi Eye Hospital and Research Centre was established in Munshiganj, a small village near the town of Amethi in Uttar Pradesh State in North India. In 2006, the first full year of operation, the hospital performed about 9,000 eye surgeries making it the largest provider of eye care in the entire state which has a population of 180 million. In spite of 70% paying a steeply subsidized rate of Rs. 500 for a cataract surgery with IOL implant, the hospital became financially viable from its third month of operation. This initial experiment in a rural village of Uttar Pradesh stands a strong testimony to the replication of the Aravind Model. It demonstrates the vital role that both the systems and culture play – a role far greater than that of mere name branding. It also demonstrates that even in an economically very poor and under developed area it is possible to offer high quality eye care to all in a financially sustainable manner. Armed with this experience and confidence, a blue print for further expansion in Uttar Pradesh, in the cities of Lucknow and Allahabad, has been developed to add at least another 100,000 surgeries a year. Priyamvada Birla Aravind Eye Hospital in Kolkatta, which came into existence along the same lines but before launch of this strategic direction has also been brought under this framework. Simultaneously the engagement with Grameen Bank in Bangladesh and Nobel Laureate Mohammed Yunus has resulted in concrete plans for establishing two eye hospitals in Bangladesh at Barisal and Bogra. The staff members for these two hospitals were handpicked from Bangladesh and are undergoing training in Madurai both in the science of eye care and in the art of providing it with compassion. A similar project is underway in Amreli in Gujarat in collaboration with Nagardas Dhanji Sanghvi Trust. In these projects in Bangladesh and Gujarat, the engagement as mutually agreed will be limited to getting the hospital up and running till stabilizing it over a period of time. In Amreli, Gujarat February 5– 9, 2006 At the request of Sun Pharmaceuticals, a study was undertaken for a situational analysis of the existing eye care facilities in Amreli district of Gujarat to assess the feasibility of starting a new eye hospital to meet the eye care service needs in the region. An initial joint site visit to Amreli was made by Sun Pharma representative Mr. Uday Baldota and LAICO Faculty, Mr. Keerti Bhusan Pradhan and Mr.S.P. Venkatesh. The study covered the visits to eye hospitals, private eye clinics, optical shops and community centre in the Amreli district. Vision Building and Strategic Planning Workshop at Priyamvada Birla Aravind Eye Hospital, Kolkata May 27-29, 2006 Dr. Datta with Participants at the Vision Building and Strategic Planning Workshop at Priyamvada Birla Aravind Eye Hospital, Kolkata The Workshop was held for 2 days at the Bellevue Hospital. The workshop was facilitated by a team from Aravind Eye Care System. The entire hospital team comprising of ophthalmologists, administrative staff, mid level ophthalmic personnel, and the leadership team attended the workshop. This workshop aimed at developing a vision amongst the participants and translating them into time bound strategies. The workshop facilitated the participants to visualize for themselves their potential, and the strategies they would like to follow to achieve it. Indira Gandhi Eye Hospital and Research Centre, Munshiganj, Amethi The Essilor Company donated a Refractive mobile van to the Indira Gandhi Eye Hospital and Research Centre at Amethi. This van will be utilized to carry out refraction checkup in the rural areas of Amethi. The van is the first of its kind in the world and has been especially designed by Essilor India for conducting refraction tests in the rural areas and onsite manufacture of spectacles. Top
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