Punjab Government, on the occasion of World Sight Day on Thursday, rolled out a plan to make the State ‘free of corneal blindness’.
A high-level round-table consultation was held to prepare a road map to identify patients suffering from curable corneal blindness and get them treated, said the state Health and Family Welfare Minister Surjit Kumar.
Jayani, addressing all civil surgeons and senior officials, said that World Sight Day is being celebrated all over Punjab by organising special screening camps for cataract, glaucoma, refractive errors, diabetic retinopathy and corneal diseases at all civil hospitals and government medical colleges.
She said that the State Government’s endeavor was to ensure that all stakeholders work in a planned and coordinated manner to achieve the target in a time bound manner.
A database of patients suffering from curable corneal blind needs to be prepared for which an online registration proforma is already available on the official website of the Health department, stressed the state Health and Medical Education secretary Hussan lal
Awareness campaign to prevent curable corneal blindness has to be launched effectively by the government along with infrastructure up-scaling and other supportive measures, he added while insisting on strengthening the Hospital Corneal Retrieval Programme in big hospitals to procure more eyeballs.
State Programme Officer NPCB Punjab Dr Rakesh Gupta enumerated the actionable points at the level of Civil Surgeons, Directorate of Medical Education and Research and in-charge of Eye Banks so that backlog of Corneal Blindness in Punjab can be cleared. He assured the participants that necessary amends will be made earnestly before adopting Transplantation of Human Organs and Tissues Act. He appreciated the role of NGOs like Eye Donation Association in Punjab in creating awareness about eye donation.