C. Shekhar Nambiar
India Vision Institute (IVI) is organising a major vision screening program in communities around Arakkonam, near Chennai. The campaign has received the funding support of MRF Ltd.
Thanking MRF for the support, IVI’s CEO, Vinod Daniel, said “it is good that corporates are coming to work together with NGOs such as ours to meet the growing need for vision care and eye health in the country’s underserved populations.”
The screenings offer a great opportunity for communities to have vision tested for uncorrected refractive errors (URE) and receive a pair of corrective glasses from IVI. People who are detected with other eye ailments are being referred to hospitals for further medical examination.
Vision screenings kickstarted on April 18 in the presence of MRF’s General Manager John Daniel and optometrists and staff from IVI. The first three days’ screening covered 720 people at Ichiputtur and Kadavarikantigai. At Ichiputtur, 293 people detected with URE are being provided with free spectacles. 188 people are being referred to hospital for further examination. At Kadavarikantigai, spectacles are being provided to 108 people detected with URE and 28 referrals have been made to hospital for further examination.
